The Odyssey Read online

  and resolved in his heart to throw them all out? His wife

  would get no joy of his homecoming, however deeply

  she'd missed him: he'd suffer a shameful death on the spot

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  if he fought outnumbered. Your threats lack reality!

  And you, good people, disperse now, each to his own affairs;

  and as for this fellow here, Mentor and Halitherses

  will speed his departure--they're old friends of his father's!

  But myself, I think he'll just sit around listening to rumors

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  right here in Ithake: he'll never accomplish this journey!"

  With that, he abruptly dismissed the assembly. They all

  dispersed at once, each man to his own house, except

  the suitors, who went off to the house of godlike Odysseus,

  and Telemachos, who withdrew, alone, to the seashore,

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  washed his hands in the grey salt water, then prayed to Athene:

  "Hear me, you god who came yesterday to our home,

  and told me to travel by ship across the misty deep

  to seek news of my long-absent father's return!

  Now all my plans are being held up by the Achaians,

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  and, above all, by these viciously arrogant suitors!"

  So he spoke in prayer, and Athene then approached him,

  assuming Mentor's likeness in both voice and appearance,

  and addressed him as follows, uttering winged words:

  "Telemachos, you'll turn out neither craven nor witless

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  if indeed you've been imbued with your father's rare strength--

  such a man he was, so masterful in both deeds and words!

  In that case your journey won't be useless or unfulfilled;

  but if you're not his son, his and Penelope's, then

  I have no hope you'll accomplish what you're planning.

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  Few are the sons who prove the equal of their fathers:

  most are worth less, hardly any prove themselves better.

  But since it would seem that you are neither craven nor witless,

  and that Odysseus' resourcefulness hasn't passed you over,

  there is a fair chance that you will bring this business off!

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  So don't worry about these suitors' attitudes and notions--

  They're witless creatures, neither sensible nor right-thinking,

  and wholly unaware of the fact that death and black fate

  are very near, that on the same day they'll all perish!

  But for you that journey you're planning is not far distant,

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  so true a companion I am to your father's family--

  I'll fit you out a swift ship, accompany you myself.

  Now go back to the house, keep company with the suitors,

  make ready provisions, pack them all in containers:

  the wine in jars, and the barley meal, men's marrow,

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  in stout leather bags. Meanwhile, I'll go through the town

  and find you a volunteer crew. As for ships, there are plenty

  here in sea-girt Ithake, both old and new: of these

  I myself will select you the one that best suits your purpose,

  and we'll soon fit her out, launch her into the open sea."

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  So spoke Zeus' daughter Athene. Telemachos did not

  linger, after he'd heard the voice of the goddess,

  but made his way back to the house, much troubled at heart,

  and found the proud suitors already there in his halls,

  busy flaying goats and singeing fat hogs in the courtyard.

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  Antinoos, laughing, came over, confronted Telemachos,

  took his hand, and had this to say to him, speaking plainly:

  "Telemachos, lofty talker, angry, outspoken--no longer

  nurse in your heart any evil thoughts or actions,

  but, please, eat and drink with us, as you did before!

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  All these things the Achaians will surely provide for you--

  a vessel and hand-picked oarsmen, to give you a speedy

  voyage to sacred Pylos, to seek news of your father."

  Sagacious Telemachos then responded to him, saying:

  "Antinoos, there's no way I could feast with you arrogant lot

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  undistracted, much less enjoy myself in comfort!

  Is it not enough, you suitors, that in the past you devoured

  so much of my choice possessions, when I was still a child!

  But now that I'm grown, and can figure the truth from what

  others tell me, and passion is surging up within me,

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  I'll try directing the evil death-spirits against you, either

  by going to Pylos, or here in this district! But go I will,

  nor shall the journey I speak of be made in vain,

  though I'm a passenger, lacking a ship and oarsmen

  of my own: this, I presume, was how you wanted it."

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  That said, he withdrew his hand from the hand of Antinoos,

  lightly. Meanwhile the suitors, busy preparing dinner

  about the house, made mock of him to each other,

  and this is how one of these arrogant youths would talk:

  "Oh, for sure, Telemachos must be planning our murder!

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  He'll bring over helpers either from sandy Pylos

  or maybe from Sparta, he wants it so desperately--

  or he's thinking of going to Ephyre, that rich plowland,

  to pick up some deadly poisons, bring them back here,

  drizzle them into the wine bowl, and destroy us all!"

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  Again, another of these arrogant youths would announce:

  "Who knows? Maybe he himself, going off in his hollow ship,

  far from his friends, will die wandering, like Odysseus!

  That way he'd cause us even more trouble--we'd have

  to share out all his possessions, turn over the house

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  to his mother to keep, and whoever it was she married."

  So they spoke. Telemachos now went down to his father's storeroom,

  broad and high-ceilinged, where gold and bronze lay piled,

  with clothes in chests, an abundance of sweet-smelling oil,

  and jars of wine, well aged and sweet on the palate,

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  holding within them an unmixed heavenly drink,

  set close together along the wall, for the day when Odysseus,

  after laboring through much hardship, might come back home.

  The close-carpentered double doors remained shut and locked,

  and both day and night a housekeeper kept watch there,

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  guarding everything, both prudent and vigilant:

  Eurykleia, daughter of Ops, Peisenor's son. Her now

  Telemachos called to the storeroom, and addressed her, saying:

  "Good old nurse, please draw me off wine in two-handled jars--

  sweet wine, the best there is after what you're keeping back

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  for him, the ill-fated one, just in case from heaven knows where

  Zeus' scion Odysseus returns, escaping death and the fates!

  Fill me twelve jars, and fit them all with stoppers,

  and measure out barley into well-stitched leather bags--

  there should be twenty measures of well-ground barley meal.

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  Have all this taken care of. No one else is to know about it.

  I'll pick up the load this evening, when my mother

  goes to her upper chamber and retires for the night.

  For I'm making a journey to Sparta and to sandy Pylos

  to seek any news I may lear
n about my dear father's return."

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  So he spoke, and his dear nurse Eurykleia shrieked aloud,

  and, lamenting, then addressed him with winged words, saying:

  "Ah, how, dear child, did this thought ever enter your mind?

  Where in this whole wide earth do you plan to go to, you,

  an only child and much loved? But Odysseus, scion of Zeus,

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  has already died, far from home, in some foreign country,

  and the moment you're gone these men will make trouble for you,

  destroy you by guile, and share out all your goods!

  Stay here and look after what's yours: you have no need

  to wander and suffer misfortunes on the unharvested sea."

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  Sagacious Telemachos then responded to her, saying:

  "Never fear, old nurse: this plan does not lack divine support!

  Now, promise you won't say a word of it to my mother

  before eleven or twelve days have passed, or else until

  she herself misses me and hears that I've set out--

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  I don't want her to spoil her fine complexion with weeping."

  So he spoke: the old woman swore a great oath, by the gods,

  that she wouldn't tell. When she'd sworn, and completed the oath,

  she at once drew off the wine in two-handled jars,

  and measured the barley meal into well-stitched leather bags,

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  while Telemachos went back to the hall and joined the suitors.

  Then the goddess, grey-eyed Athene, had another thought:

  in Telemachos' likeness she went all around the city,

  approaching each man in turn with an identical message,

  that they should assemble that evening alongside the swift ship.

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  That done, she then asked Noemon, illustrious son

  of Phronios, for a swift ship. He readily promised it her.

  So the sun went down, and all the ways were in shadow,

  and she drew the swift ship down to the sea, and left it

  with all the gear that well-benched vessels carry,

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  moored at the harbor entrance. Beside it a doughty

  company gathered: the goddess put strength in each man there.

  Then the goddess, grey-eyed Athene, had another thought:

  she made her way to the home of godlike Odysseus,

  and there shed sweet drowsiness over all the suitors

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  as they drank, befuddled their wits, made them drop their cups.

  Up they got, to go home to bed: no longer did they

  sit on there, now sleep weighed heavy on their eyelids.

  That done, to Telemachos grey-eyed Athene now spoke,

  called him out from his well-established domain,

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  assuming the likeness of Mentor, in both form and voice:

  "Telemachos, already your well-greaved comrades are seated

  at their oars, ready and waiting for the start of your voyage!

  Come then, let's go, no point in delaying your departure."

  That said, Pallas Athene now briskly led the way,

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  and Telemachos followed behind, in the goddess' footsteps.

  When they came down to the sea and the vessel, they found

  their long-haired comrades there, awaiting them on the shore,

  and Telemachos, princely in power, now addressed them, saying:

  "Come, friends, let us fetch the provisions: they're all ready,

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  back in the hall. My mother knows nothing of this,

  nor do her maidservants, except for the one I told."

  So saying, he led the way, and they accompanied him.

  They carried back all the provisions, stowed them away

  in the well-benched ship, as Odysseus' fine son commanded.

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  Then Telemachos went aboard, preceded by Athene,

  who sat herself down in the stern, and Telemachos came

  and sat down beside her. Men cast off the stern warps

  and scrambled aboard, and took their seats on the benches.

  Now grey-eyed Athene sent them a following wind,

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  a fresh west wind, loud-sounding over the wine-dark deep.

  Telemachos urged on his crew, gave them the order

  to haul on the sheets, and they obeyed his command.

  They raised the fir-wood mast, set it upright in its hollow

  mast-block, firmly belayed the sheets to the forestays,

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  then hauled up the white sail with cords of plaited oxhide.

  The wind bellied the mid-sail, and cleft by the cutwater

  a dark surging wave sang aloud as the ship drove forward,

  shearing her path through the deep, accomplishing her journey.

  When they'd belayed the tackle in the swift black ship

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  they set out mixing bowls brimming with wine, and poured

  libations to the immortal gods that are forever,

  and foremost of all to the grey-eyed daughter of Zeus.

  So all night and into the dawn the vessel cut her course.

  Book 3

  Deserting the deep's enchanting surface, the sun rose up

  into the brazen sky to bring light both to immortals

  and to mortal beings upon the grain-rich plowland,

  and they came to Pylos, the well-built citadel of Neleus.

  Here, on the shore of the sea, sacrifices were being made

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  of all-black bulls to the dark-haired Earth-Shaker. Nine

  companies there were, and five hundred men were seated

  in each, and each brought nine bulls. It was when they'd sampled

  the innards and were burning thigh pieces for the gods

  that the travelers arrived. They at once hauled up and brailed

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  the trim ship's sail, moored her, and came ashore themselves.

  With Athene leading the way, Telemachos disembarked,

  and the goddess, grey-eyed Athene, now first addressed him, saying:

  "Telemachos, you've no longer the least need for modesty--

  the whole point of your voyage is to get news of your father:

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  where he may have been buried, what kind of fate he met.

  But for now, go straight up to Nestor, tamer of horses,

  and let's find out what advice lies hidden in his breast!

  Entreat him yourself, have him tell you the true story--

  a lie he won't utter: he's a most sagacious person."

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  Sagacious Telemachos answered her in these words:

  "What, Mentor, must be my approach? How am I to greet him?

  I've no experience yet in subtle discourse; a young

  man feels embarrassed when interrogating his elders."

  Then the goddess, grey-eyed Athene, responded to him, saying:

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  "Telemachos, there are some things you'll figure out for yourself,

  and for others you'll have divine guidance--I don't think

  you were born and raised without the gods' good favor."

  So Pallas Athene spoke, and proceeded to lead the way

  briskly, Telemachos following in the goddess' footsteps,

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  and they came to the Pylian men's assembly and companies.

  There Nestor sat with his sons, and around them their comrades

  were preparing the feast, roasting some meat, had the rest on spits.

  But when they spotted the strangers, they all came flocking

  to meet them, shook their hands, made them sit down.

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  Peisistratos, Nestor's son, was the first to reach them,

  took them both by the hand, seated them at the feast


  on soft sheepskins, there on the sandy seashore,

  next to his father and Thrasymedes his brother,

  gave them helpings of innards, poured out wine