Throughout the Wanderings of Odysseus, we see various displays of Odysseus' leadership skills, but also (and more importantly) how he doesn't act like a hero. The very first thing they come across - the Cyclops - Odysseus leads them in bravely, and when they become stuck and are being killed off, Odysseus organizes them and blinds the Cyclops, escaping on the belly of the sheep. However, in that same event, Odysseus tries to abuse Xenia and obtain gifts from the Cyclops, keeping everyone there who tried to leave. When they are leaving, Odysseus can't help but call out his name and taunt the Cyclops, which causes him to curse their voyage and ultimately lose all their men.
When Odysseus lands on Circe's island, he sends out men to scout - a leader-like thing to do. However later, when one of his men disagrees with accepting the offer Circe makes to feast with her, Odysseus needs to be kept back from cutting his head off. Finally, Odysseus ignores the advice of Circe to not arm himself against Scylla, he does so anyway while also deciding not to tell his men of their six upcoming casualties, because it would not help and only put the rest of them in danger.
These three examples each show times when Odysseus is acting like a leader, doing things for the good of his men and taking control of the crew, but also show times when Odysseus doesn't act in his own self interest but rather violently and out of control. He does things both with thinking and without thinking. The reason for these two different parts of him lies in the fact that he is a warrior by trade. His life has been focused around strategically planning what to do in any situation, but then also to completely throw aside thought and reasoning whenever he needs to fight. This can be seen in that the first city he and his portion of the army go to rest they sack and kill all the men, while this same group (albeit considerably smaller) swears not to kill Helios' cows, until they run out of food and are forced to.
Odysseus and his men have all been bred into a society that favors leaders that can construct plans but then can also go haywire on the battlefield. The Iliad also emphasizes this, with some particular heroes dragging their enemies behind chariots, and also rampaging up to the front gates. This society, when crammed into a life-threatening situation on a boat in the middle of nowhere doesn't release itself in a very good form, and while his men are mostly collected throughout the journey, this explains Odysseus' various fits of violence and irrationality.
Odysseus clearly has bravery and won't back down from anything, which makes him an amazing warrior. As you said though, these traits don't translate very well into leadership skills. I think a trait of a good leader is someone who cares for and respects all his men, which Odysseus doesn't seem to do. He treats them more as pawns, seemingly unfazed with sacrificing or leading them to their deaths. He is much better suited fighting on the battlefield.
ReplyDeleteWhile I agree that his particular skills are more suited for a battlefield, I think it is ironic that this is the same person who originally attempted to get out of going to Troy. This is also the same person who we think of as a quintessential hero and leader of men, which is interesting to think about.
DeleteNice blog. The leadership and violence that you're describing kind of sounds like toxic masculinity - these men (including Odysseus) feel more compelled for glory or something like that (when they sack the city or Odysseus yells his name) than they do for their own lives. I think that the story kind of criticizes that, which is interesting, because toxic masculinity is a pretty new idea and term. It's interesting that perhaps people in Homer's time were thinking about that. Or maybe Homer is just telling it like he sees it? I don't know. Nice post!!!
ReplyDeleteI'm beginning to wonder if Odysseus is just a really good soldier who became a leader because everyone looked up to him for his fighting ability. Everything we've seen has been Odysseus trying to gain personal glory. The 'No-man' trick would have worked pretty well on his own, though having extra men along gave Odysseus some time. His leadership style in general seems to be to throw more bodies at a problem, which is about how ground battle strategy worked back then.
ReplyDeleteI like how you relate Odysseus' behavior to the Iliad - there, we see greek "heroes" acting in ways that are very much not okay to our modern ears. It's a good reminder that in such a different time period, we shouldn't be to quick to reject our own biases onto a character.
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