With all the newsworthy events of 2020, you might have missed it, but Odysseus has been in the news lately! Ancient Greece might seem out of place for a news publication, but The Odyssey provides a rich vocabulary of emotion which journalists employ to interpret the modern day.

These maps depict one interpretation of Odysseus’ Journey (created by Giulia Zoccarato, DensityDesign Research Lab) and a simplified version of Orlando Pimentel’s Journey (created by the author).

Odysseus in South America

When the podcast Rough Translation crafted a story about Orlando Pimentel and the trek he organized from Guayaquil to Caracas, they decided to draw a comparison to The Odyssey. Pimentel is a Venezuelan immigrant, and when the pandemic hit Ecuador his fledgling food truck business suffered a debilitating loss. He and many other Venezuelan immigrants wanted to whether this storm with their families, but there was no way for them to return home except to walk. Comparing his heroic walk to Odysseus’ circuitous homecoming allowed the journalists to depict the emotions and difficulties of a long journey home, one rife with challenges and against the will of higher powers, in shorthand. The reference appears when they are talking with Pimentel’s daughter, who had recently read the epic poem. Although she took no journey of her own, and she had no greedy suitors to face, she could still picture herself in Telemachus’ shoes. The Odyssey is the blueprint for a wide range of complex emotions like the strain of separation on a family, the particular brand of loneliness when you’re stranded in an unknown place, and coming of age without a paternal figure.

Odysseus on Instagram

Excerpts from a series of illustrations depicting Odysseus as an Instagram influencer published by the Washington Post.

Erica Lies and Elly Lonon, the authors of a satirical article depicting Odysseus as an Instagram influencer, crafted an effective critique of hero worship and influencer culture through a set of illustrations and captions of Odysseus documenting his journey. This article only works because Odysseus is an easily accessible character for their readership, and with a little mental gymnastics Odysseus’ proud boasts and carefully curated speeches translate beautifully into a self-aggrandizing platform like Instagram. With pervasive cancel culture, it has become much tougher to escape your past missteps as a public figure. Our identity in the modern day is inescapable, so unlike Odysseus, we don’t have the option to go to a new place and reinvent ourselves to new people. This microscopic view of public figures has called into question the whole institution of god-like celebrities and heroes among us, and what better figure to examine than the flawed leader Odysseus? This article simultaneously critiques the emergence of influencer culture, and why they have influence in the first place by referencing another flawed object of fame, Odysseus in The Odyssey.

How?

In both of these cases, distance from our current world adds clarity; by separating their critique from contemporary figures and their respective baggage, the journalists in both stories are able to bypass modern disputes and communicate more effectively. Although controversies and debates about The Odyssey are alive and well, in the context of the news, Odysseus serves as a neutral character. By exploiting different aspects of The Odyssey, writers are able to skip over the fraught and easily miscommunicated emotions surrounding events of today to communicate their own ideas about the world we live in. Heroic feats are often normalized, and even disdained, in the media especially if the heroes in question are residents of the so-called ‘global South.’ Instead of framing Pimentel’s journey as an inevitable response to inherent flaws in the region, the comparison to Odysseus allows for recognition of Pimentel’s heroism. Pimentel is a markedly different hero than Odysseus – he is a great leader, devoted to even the slowest walkers in his group, and much better at getting his group to abide by important rules – but their journeys home are similar enough to employ the richness of Homeric vocabulary. There are plenty of differences between Odysseus and influencers too, but it doesn’t take 1000 words to draw a comparison between the riches he extracts from his social position and the income of influencers.

Why?

The U.S. based podcast, Rough Translation markets their episodes as “stories from far away places that hit close to home.” Although Ancient Greece doesn’t look like home for their audience, the analysis of Homeric texts is a common theoretical ground. The authors in both cases are able to critique the idea of the supremacy of the Western tradition while deftly employing its legacy. Rough Translation taps into the vast influence of the Homeric tradition as a vehicle for connecting their audience to someone outside of this tradition, and Lies and Lanon expose enduring negative characteristics of Western tradition like egocentrism. The Homeric poems and other ‘Great Books’ provide rich language, and these journalists demonstrate that you don’t have to agree with the premise in which they were popularized to take advantage of their vocabulary. In this way, promoting The Odyssey as a prime example of the excellence of Western culture provides a forum for its own criticism. 

By Elizabeth Shaw

Assistant Editor of the Bakers Dozen Section of the Maroon News