"New Evidence of Odysseus: Was a Real Man Behind ..." Topic

…the Legend?

"Christopher Nolan's blockbuster adaptation of Homer's epic has finally arrived in cinemas, with Matt Damon's portrayal of the beleaguered king of Ithaca captivating audiences worldwide. Yet as the film sparks fierce debate over casting and historical accuracy, it has also reignited a far older question that has fascinated scholars for centuries: was Odysseus a real person? The answer, as with so much of the ancient world, lies somewhere between the soil and the story.

Modern scholars generally regard the Odyssey as legend rather than historical record, yet the line between myth and memory in the ancient world was never clearly drawn. As the New York Times reported just before the film's release, archaeologists working on the Greek island of Ithaca have uncovered compelling evidence that to the Greeks of antiquity, Odysseus was not merely a literary creation but a figure of genuine, abiding devotion…"

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Armand

I have always thought of Homer as a wandering bard. And that basically agrees with the legend. Blind? 🤷 Meh.
When he visits a new city, he has the story of their legendary hero memorized and loaded. Don't dismiss that. He had no cellphone and Google. His job was to memorize.
So, when he traveled to Argos, he knew what a badass Diomedes was, and gave the locals a fine story. Read Book 5 of the Iliad. He's 2-0-1 vs the Immortal Gods! (That's how *I* read it. YMMV)
Every town he visited, he gave the local hero his due. I am perfectly happy to "believe" that all the important Heroes had a factual background.

I am NOT going to dismiss either the Iliad or Odyssey as "mere legend". What was the background? The background had to come from somewhere.
(Helen and Clytemnestra's mom was raped by Zeus in the form of a swan? Ummmm… 🙄)
But, there has to be a background story somewhere.

I am perpetually irritated by clickbait titles like "New excavations on Argos/Ithica/Sparta/Thebes totally rewrite history!" It's almost always that the "legends" are true, and that some "mythic agnostic" dope dismissed them out of vanity.
Yeah. Rewrite HIS history, because he was a dumb fool.

I will never be surprised when "modern research proves" that Achilles, both Ajaxes, Agamemnon, and of course Diomedes and Idysseus existed. Heck, I'll even throw a bone to Aeneas.

I shall not step into the swamp of when, and how, all the TRUE legends were compiled and written. Oh, yes. And edited.
That's for scholars. Me? I'm just a fanboy, who believes in the literal truth of Homer. D'oh!

They're pretty sure they found his tomb. Seems he was only about 5 feet tall… ;-)

Oh, that would be Elliot.

(smile)

Armand

My kindest take on the movie is -- tedious. The movie story flow is disjointed, and some of their encounters just feel like an overland D&D journey using random encounter tables. The only place that gets any set up is the Island of the Sun God and da Cows, but everything else is like, "Oh look, it'st whirlpool!" When they landed on the island of giants (now wearing full steel plate armor) and meet an oversized kid, the extent of the scene set up feels like a GM who didn't plan a game session…

GM[rolls dice] – OK, you see an island. What do you want to do?

Players: Uh, outta food and water, yeah? We land on the island and search for provisions. WHat do we see?

GM: It's a heavily wooded island, with light mist that makes everything hazy…you don't see anything obvious.

Players: OK, we'll search for water and food. I'll roll survival -- 11.

GM: Um, you don't see anything obvious and as you walk further, ummm… [rolls dice] you encounter… huh… [rolls dice again]… what looks like a large child, or childlike person in the woods. WHat do you do.

Players: We're gonna grab… no, wait, let's talk to them. I'll approach and say, "Greetings child, we mean you no harm, we're lost and hungry and seek help."

GM: OK, make a Charisma check…

Player: I have Persuasion, so I get advantage on the d20 roll…and [rolls dice], carp! double 1s!?!?

GM: That's definitely a critical fail, so the kid panics and starts screaming her head off, and you hear these bellows from the woods and these HUGE armored forms with massive falchions charge at you, metal clad giants! Roll for initiative!

Players: ?!? [roll initiative]

GM: OK, Giant win and the first one swings at a crewman, hits, does 3d10 +10 damage…and chops the man in half…

Isn't it lucky that new evidence emerges just in time to advertise the movie…

…it's like the luck of the gods…

It is an impressive modern movie about the psychological scars of war, how war changes people and destroys values, the loneliness of soldiers wifes, the lies that are told to start wars. It is not a remake of any sword and sandal film; there are no heroes.

Thanks

Armand

@dogtail I still wasn't impressed. More than half the movie seems to take place at night, all the costumes and sets are in dark tones and the way Nolan treated the Odyssey like a PTSD flashback felt disjointed to me. There's a cut every few seconds and there'll be like 5 cuts during 1 sentence. For me that's very jarring, never letting me get immersed into a scene, and it made the nearly 3hr movie feel like an eternity. I'm pretty sure they used ai at the giants bit, 1 dude gets thrown through a tree but instead of breaking the way a tree would, even though a person can't break a tree that thick at all, the part of the tree that he hits just blips out of existence…

But that's my take on it…. OK, you see an Island, what do you want to do? Make a Perception check…

Thanks also…

Armand