HeroesX | Hour 09 Episode 16: Alkinoos Asks Why Odysseus Weeps

Gregory Nagy and Keith Stone read out of Text I, the moment in Rhapsody viii where Alkinoos asks the still-unidentified Odysseus why he is weeping at Demodokos's song. Nagy notes the irony: Odysseus weeps at the suffering of Troy's victims, yet he was on the side of inflicting that suffering. Alkinoos then probes further, asking whether Odysseus lost a comrade as dear as a brother — a clear gesture toward Achilles and Patroklos — which forces Odysseus toward a crossroads: he will have to tell his own story in Rhapsody ix. Stone observes that Odysseus did in fact lose all his comrades as a consequence of his actions at Troy, and Nagy draws a sharp contrast: Achilles, for all his alienation, saved his comrades with Patroklos's help, but Odysseus cannot save a single one. TIMESTAMPS 00:33 Text I: Alkinoos asks Odysseus why he weeps at the song of Troy 01:27 Odysseus was on the side of inflicting the suffering, not enduring it 02:19 Alkinoos gestures toward Achilles: did you lose a comrade as dear as a brother? 02:46 The comrade would be Patroklos; Odysseus's pain is a different kind 03:04 End of Rhapsody 8: Odysseus at the crossroads; he will tell his story in Rhapsody 9 03:46 Stone: Odysseus lost all his comrades as a consequence of what he did at Troy 04:05 Athena planned destruction for Odysseus and his crew after Troy 04:24 Odysseus is the only survivor; not one comrade makes it back to Ithaca 04:30 Contrast with Achilles: he saved his comrades with the help of Patroklos ABOUT THIS SERIES HeroesX, also known as The Ancient Greek Hero, is an open-access learning project created by Professor Gregory Nagy and first launched in 2013. It grew out of Harvard's longest-running course, "The Ancient Greek Hero," which Nagy has taught for over fifty years. Since the project's launch, more than 172,000 participants from over 170 countries have joined. It invites everyone, with or without prior experience, to read closely from some of the most beautiful works of ancient Greek literature in English translation: the Homeric Iliad and Odyssey, tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, songs of Sappho and Pindar, dialogues of Plato, and selections from On Heroes by Philostratus. Throughout the project, Nagy and his team model techniques for reading out of these works inductively, so that learners can begin to see this literature as an exquisite system of communication. It is not a graded course. It is content, community, and conversation that many participants describe as transformative. ABOUT THE NEW ALEXANDRIA FOUNDATION For more than a decade, HeroesX has welcomed learners from around the world, and it now finds a new home at the New Alexandria Foundation, which expands access to the comparative study of civilizations, ancient and modern. Through technology and community, we foster living humanistic dialogues, open to all and enduring across generations. The full HeroesX video library lives on this YouTube channel, and NAF shares the surrounding content, including primary readings, exercises, and resources, to support your reading. 🌐 https://newalexandriafoundation.org/ RESOURCES 🏛️ HeroesX home on Classical Continuum: https://continuum.fas.harvard.edu/her... 📘 Read Gregory Nagy's book, The Ancient Greek Hero in 24 Hours, free online with illustrations: https://chs.harvard.edu/book/nagy-gre... 📚 Read or download the Sourcebook online (English translations of all the texts discussed in the book and in HeroesX): https://continuum.fas.harvard.edu/the... ✉️ Be the first to hear about HeroesX developments and join an upcoming cohort: https://mailchi.mp/9a41aac39c45/6cnmu... ❤️ Love this work? Help keep HeroesX free and growing with a gift to the New Alexandria Foundation: https://newalexandriafoundation.org/d... #AncientGreek #HeroesX #GregoryNagy #Homer #Iliad #Odyssey #GreekMythology #ClassicalLiterature #Humanities #NewAlexandriaFoundation