Make Better Choices: You ARE Odysseus

Many of us read the Odyssey for the first time because it is part of a certain kind of cultural inheritance in the literary canon. But we remain engaged with it, I think, because the character’s flexibility and adaptability. He is closer to us than some heroes, thanks to his physical vulnerability and his characteristic intelligence (instead of superhuman strength; and he goes through things. His journeys make for easy metaphors for our own; and his ability to persevere has made him an attractive model for philosophers and eventually theologians as well. He is a villain on the tragic stage; a rival in early rhetoric; and a sage by the Roman Empire. The Homeric Odyssey cannot contain everything the hero represents, but it does draw us in, asking the audience to wonder more about what could have happened if this hero’s life had been different in one small way…

Laura Jenkinson-Brown’s You are Odysseus finds new space for telling Odysseus’ story between the static audience engagement of reading and the immersive wandering of Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey. She sets out with a remarkable twist on how we engage with his story: what if we can intervene in some of his decisions? What if we can be author of a part of his tale? This may sound like a great leap from an ancient cliff, but it responds to the spirit of the Odyssey well. At the beginning of the poem, Zeus complains that “Mortals are always blaming us gods for their suffering / when they have suffering beyond their fate because of their recklessness” (1.30-32). His introduction offers a thematic framework that encourages audiences to ask how people make their own lives worse and how, in turn, it might be possible to make them better. You Are Odysseus takes the experience one step further.

I wasn’t surprised to find this book engaging and fun. L. Jenkinson-Brown has been the genius behind GreekMythComix for years, blending a heavy dose of facts with sharp and striking illustrations. As an educator, Jenkinson-Brown has a good sense of how to tell a story herself and makes great use of short, direct statements in often jarring collocations. Consider the effective coverage of the following graphic, which contains at a glance what it might take me a full lecture to convey:

One of the most interesting things about the way Jenkinson-Brown sets this up us that you can choose which character to read as, identifying as someone other than Odysseus. For the majority of us, the story traces the hero’s journey home, starting around the first event of Odysseus’ own story, the conflict between his men and the Cicones (told in Odyssey 9). Each episode is read addressed to the reader, numbered for their sequence in the overarching range of possibilities Jenkinson-Brown has sketched out.

What does choice in the Odyssey look like? Giving too much away would ruin any future experience, but let me give you a few samples. After Odysseus’ raft fails, the narrator gives the reader two choices

It is all too much. You resign yourself to the waves – and obscurity. Go to 143.

You’re not done yet – Zeus has decreed that you will return home! Go to 244.

The exhausted among us who are tempted to give into the sea’s embrace are treated to a few more paragraphs of regrets about Telemachus and Penelope before we’re invited to the epilogue (which contains an invitation to try again). If we choose to swim, we end up on the shore, talking to a sea bird, who may or may not be a god. Part of the fun of enjoying the Odyssey this way is that I know what kind of story to expect, and I find it in different pieces, refracted to me here, and reinvented for me there. But in the background is the Siren call of the story I already know as I search for it.

Another interesting aspect of this way of engaging with the tale is how the narrator can talk about the character’s gaze, thereby directing ours. After Odysseus has made the blood sacrifice to attract the souls of the dead, the reader is told that we start to feel “weak with panic” as our companions turn pale. The panic is punctuated by possible options:

I won’t spoil any surprises here. But if you know the Odyssey, you can guess some of what will happen next. I think it is that act of eliciting guesses though that commends this method of storytelling to me too. We know that ancient audiences were familiar with different details and variations of the big stories from ancient Greece. Some of the excitement from viewing this year’s version of a tragedy or listening to the most recent rhapsodic performance comes from discovering how the regular story would be told; but a certain degree of pleasure comes from suspense over which details of the story this accounting will tell.

Jenkinson-Brown is not shy about integrating other stories from myth, like the tale of the counterfeit Helen that comes as part of the episode involving Proteus, the old man of the sea. Such inclusions are far from disquieting, instead they remind of the way that others stories are always threatening to intrude on myth in Homer (and ancient Greece altogether). Jenkinson-Brown finds within this possibility the ability to tell of Odyssean counter-lives, not just the hero who gives up and never makes it home, but one who does make it home, but lingers in a hut like a hermit, waiting for something to happen, rather than striving to make it so.

Don’t worry if it seems like this approach may go too easy on Odysseus—the Muse speaks to him directly and catalogues exactly how many of his people died and whose fault it was (just before the final members of his crew disappear). Jenkinson-Brown takes creative turns—as in the section entitled “The Tragedy of Odysseus”, which, in centering the enslaved women as the chorus reminds me of Margaret Atwood’s Penelopiad before Odysseus sings outside his house about his desire to be “Odysseus again”. Just as in tragedy, there’s a recognition scene (here, Eumaeus misrecognizing Odysseus). The confusion ends up with multiple main characters deceased thanks to a certain scar not convincing anyone. Athena, that classic dea ex machina, appears to declare “he was not what he was / his choices all were wrong,  / and now his story ends – / before an Epic tale, / a tragedy instead”. The epilogue is one of the collection’s finer points from the serious side of things. Jenkinson-Brown closes by making the point that Odysseus’ decisions are not simple, interwoven as they are with the tensions between mere survival and attempt to be some kind of a moral agent. The difference for us, however, is that thanks to Jenkinson-Brown’s work we can experiment with doing the whole thing again.

The combination of irreverence and seriousness keeps readers moving through the choices, uncertain. I don’t think there is a wrong way to read this book: each episode has some insights on its own; even where there are departures from Homer, they are instructive and intriguing. One could quibble about not being able to be one of the suitors or that certain of our favorite tales are left out. But the pleasure of reading through a fast-paced journey that manages to be knowledgeable and funny at the same time is undeniable.

This is easiest read on actual paper! But the prose is clear and direct, and the leaping from scene to scene makes has the effect of creating excitement and some confusion. There’s a knowing wit to the retelling as well, as when Odysseus is with Circe and we read “As your men drift off to find a comfortable place to sleep for the night – not the roof, you remind them – Circe slips her hand into yours and draws you aside.” The dark humor of the reminder, recalling Elpenor for those who know, stands strangely next to the nearly saccharine hand-holding. But there’s something about it that rings true in just that Odyssean ways of rendering lies that sound like the truth. The narrator frequently characterizes emotions, effectively emphasizing an interior experience, flipping the normal, distanced engagement with Homer on its head.

There are many ways I can imagine using this book in the classroom or with readers coming to Homer from different backgrounds. I think this approach could pair really well with Gareth Hinds’ graphic novel of the Odyssey for readers who don’t have the time or the practice to get through a translation for the first time. Then, again, it also provides enough information to support learning about the Odyssey on its own. I read through this one with my daughter (15) who has read Hinds’ graphic novel and has been listening to me drone on about Odysseus for years. She thinks Jenkinson-Brown’s approach is better than mine, and she has some experience! If she and I both like this book, there’s a good chance there’s something in it for you too.

Go to this link if you want to purchase the book.

Go to this one if you’re still thinking about it.