Odysseus in The Odyssey
...on this house. Fight your way out, or run for it, if you think you’ll escape death. I doubt one man of you skins by” (871-872). Odysseus does not have a high tolerance level. Penelope tests him to see if he really is the man he claims to be. She tells her maid to move the bed outside the bedchamber. This angers Odysseus because he knows that in order for the bed he had once built to be moved, it must have been sawed away. It is built into a tree and is so heavy it could not possibly be moved. He replies to this act by saying, “ Woman by heaven you’ve stung me now! Who dared to move my bed? No builder had the skill for that—unless a god came down to turn the trick. No mortal in his best days could budge it with a crowbar. There is our pact and pledge, our secret sign, built into that bed—my handiwork and no one else’s”(878). When Odysseus is disguised as a beggar and reveals himself to Telemachus, Telemachus has a difficult time believing the beggar really is his father in disguise. Odysseus has trouble keeping his patience. “Odysseus brought his ranging mind to bear and said: ‘ this is not princely, to be swept away by wonder at your father’s presence. No other Odysseus will ever come, for he and I are one, the same; his bitter fortune and his wanderings are mine. Twenty years gone, and I am back again on my own island’”(855). Telemachus finally accepts Odysseus as his father. Odysseus is still an example of a true epic hero. He thinks before he acts and is very clever. He defeats Polyphemus, a Cyclops. He is clever enough to know that if they kill Polyphemus while being trapped in the cave with him, they cannot get out of the cave. Odysseus knows that he and his men cannot defeat Polyphemus with a fair fight. He gives the Cyclops a type of alcoholic beverage and waits until the giant is in a drunken state. Odysseus is a determined man who never gives up, even when the odds are against him. During this whole story, Odysseus is not ever heard saying he wants to give up. He never loses hope. When Charybdis is taking her effect on their ship, Odysseus builds up the confidence of his crew by saying,”Friends have we never been in danger before this? More fearsome, is it now, than when the Cyclops penned us in his cave? What power he ha...