Blogger #6 - Anton Ianachi - Period 1 - 4/16/21 - Day A

Aim: How can an understanding of Greek myths and heroes prepare us for

our examination of Homer’s epic poem, The Odyssey?

Do Now:

Brainstorm the qualities that you feel belong to a “hero”. What do you believe might be a working definition of “hero” you could share with the class.

This do now prompt was a whole class discussion, we thought for a few moments and then shared our ideas. Overall most of us had the same ideas on what a hero should be. We mostly discussed how a hero should be selfless, someone who helps others without thinking about a reward.

After the do now, we had another class discussion. The topic of this discussion was what we knew about Greek heroes or Greek mythology. The class mentioned how the gods were selfish with their enormous power. We also discussed how Greek mythology also contains mythical creatures like centaurs. Lastly the class mentioned how heroes in Greek mythology were half mortal half god beings who did great things.

Gods to Remember (may be important in the reading of The Odyssey):

Zeus: God of the sky, lightning, and thunder. King of the gods

on Mount Olympus. Below is a bust of Zeus.

Hades: God of the underworld, or also known as the Lord of the

Dead. Hades is the husband of Persephone. 

Athena: The Daughter of Zeus, goddess of wisdom, courage, battle.

Poseidon: God of the sea and earthquakes. 

Epics:

An epic is a long narrative poem typically about some sort of hero. There are several distinct differences between a standard poem and an epic. An epic begins in the middle of the action in the story, the epic then explains how the character got into that situation using many flashbacks. The setting is vast, it contains many speeches, and has guest appearances from the gods. An epic begins in the middle of the story to draw a listeners (or readers) attention. If it were me I would rather read about an action filled story rather than wait for the action to start while the setting is described through exposition. Our previous knowledge of poetry will come into use when analyzing excerpts from epics.

Epics of Ancient Greece:

Ancient Greek culture produced two epics, The Odyssey and The Iliad. Both of these were written by Homer. A bit off topic, but people don’t know if Homer was an actual person that existed, or was a collection of people writing under a pseudonym. Below is an image of how Ancient Greek culture painted heroes.

We later had a discussion about the overuse of the word hero and how it has morphed into a different meaning in the past few decades. The class discussed how the word hero has come to denote a person who does any good deed, even if it's so small. Some people also elaborated that today's “superheroes” have come to mean a similar thing to the classical age heroes. Superheroes are extraordinary while still having flaws and are represented in many parts of our media. I believe that the word “hero” used to embody someone extraordinary but in recent times has lost its meaning. This is a great analog to many words which in the modern day have lost touch with their denotation and focus primarily on the connotation of how our culture perceives the word.

Reflection:

In today’s lesson I learned the basics of Greek Mythology, this knowledge will help me throughout our discussion of The Odyssey. I also learned what an epic was, while I heard of the word before today was the first time I heard it being used to describe a type of poem. I have noticed that many types of media (especially movies) contain a similar format as an epic, where the viewer is placed in the middle of the action and given flashbacks to how the character ended up in the present situation. I believe that as I learn more about these terms, the more I will create connections with ordinary things in my life.