Dialogue 10 Handout

The Homeric concepts of noos 'mind' and nostos 'return' in the Odyssey

Both words can be traced back to the root *nes-, on which more below.

A) Odyssey i 1-12: That man, tell me about him, O Muse, about that many-sided man who wandered far and wide after he had sacked the famous citadel of Troy. Many cities did he visit, and many were the people with whose customs and thinking [noos] he was acquainted; many pains [algea] he suffered at sea while seeking to save his own life [psukhē] and to achieve the safe homecoming [nostos] of his companions; but do what he might he could not save his men, for they perished through their own sheer recklessness in eating the cattle of the Sun-god Helios; so the god prevented them from ever reaching home. Tell me, as you have told those who came before me, about all these things, O daughter of Zeus, starting from whatsoever point you choose. [11] So now all who escaped death in battle or by shipwreck had got safely home except Odysseus, and he, though he was longing for his return [nostos] to his wife and country, was detained by the goddess Calypso, ...

The key word for this dialogue: noos: designates the realm of consciousness, of rational functions; 'intuition, perception'; principle that reintegrates thumos (or menos) and psukhē after death

In i 3 Odysseus saw the cities of many and came to know their/his noos

In i 5 Odysseus is seeking to win as a prize his psukhē and the nostos of his companions

The key word for this dialogue, noos, is related to the key word in the previous dialogue: nostos 'return, homecoming; song about homecoming; return to light and life'. Now I add another level of meaning: 'coming to' in the sense of 'return to consciousness' after either fainting or death.

In i 4, which is the verse that is sandwiched in between the verse mentioning noos and the verse mentioning nostos, we read that Odysseus suffered many algea 'pains'; same word as in Iliad i 2; cf. the modernizing word "analgesic" (e.g. aspirin).

Note the modern word that is built from a combination of algea 'pains' (as in Odyssey i 4) and nostos (as in Odyssey i 5): it is nostalgia. In Modern Greek, nostimos means what? [GN will be expecting an answer from native speakers of Modern Greek. Hint for non-Greeks: think of the word madeleine in the world of Marcel Proust, "A la recherche du temps perdu."].

With regard to the inherent sadness of the word nostalgia, compare the ethos of love songs in traditional societies: most of them are "sad."

An example: this aria from Gianni Schicchi, by Giacomo Puccini:

Back to the subject of noos... Consider the positive and the negative values built into the names Antinoos and Alkinoos: their names mean, respectively: 'he who is opposed to bringing back to light and life' and 'he who has the power to bring back to light and life'

Both words, noos and nostos, are derived from the Indo-European root *nes- 'return to light and life' (Greek is one of many Indo-European languages; other IE languages are Latin, Sanskrit, Hittite, etc.); from Indo-European languages other than Greek, we see that this root *nes- occurs in myths having to do with Morning Star / Evening Star.

The meanings of noos and nostos are relevant to the overall plot of the Homeric Odyssey.

The surface meaning of Odyssey: safe return from war, safe return from the sea.

The underlying meaning of Odyssey: safe return from death; this implicit theme is made explicit in Theognis 1123-1124:

Do not remind me of my misfortunes! The kinds of things that happened to Odysseus have happened to me too.

Odysseus, who returned, emerging from the great palace of Hades,

            and who then killed the suitors with a pitiless thžmos.

The most easily perceived connection of the two words noos and nostos: Odyssey ix 82-104, about the Land of the Lotus-Eaters: if you lose the "implant" of homecoming in your mind, you cannot go home because you no longer know what home is.

Here is another negative threat to noos and nostos... Odyssey x 190-202, to which Fitzgerald refers as an "island nightmare." In the book Best of the Achaeans, I speak of Iliadic nightmares in the Odyssey... It is about the disorientation of Odysseus and his companions. The metaphor of orientation recapitulates noos / nostos. And disorientation recapitulates the negation of noos / nostos. The disorientation is described in this passage:

B) Odyssey x 190-202: 'My friends, we are in very great difficulties; listen therefore to me. We have no idea where the sun either sets or rises, so that we do not even know East from West. I see no way out of it; nevertheless, we must try and find one. We are certainly on an island, for I went as high as I could this morning, and saw the sea reaching all round it to the horizon; it lies low, but towards the middle I saw smoke rising from out of a thick forest of trees.' [198] Their hearts sank as they heard me, for they remembered how they had been treated by the Laestrygonian Antiphates, and by the savage ogre Polyphemus. They wept bitterly in their dismay, but there was nothing to be got by crying.

Is there a difference between the pains of the Iliad and Odyssey? For an answer, consider this passage...

C) Odyssey iv 219-226: Then Zeus' daughter Helen bethought her of another matter. She drugged the wine with an herb that banishes all care, sorrow, and ill humor. Whoever drinks wine thus drugged cannot shed a single tear all the rest of the day, not even though his father and mother both of them drop down dead, or he sees a brother or a son hewn in pieces before his very eyes.

In the original Greek Helen's drug is called nēpenthes ('non-penthos') and is described as a‑kholon (literally, 'without kholos'; kholos = 'anger'). Note that the son of Menelaos, at the beginning of Odyssey iv, is named Megapenthēs.

The drug nēpenthes is meant to cancel the penthos of the Iliad... Here I repeat from the previous dialogue the passage about the "return" to the song of Troy:

D) Odyssey viii 514-534: Then he [= the singer] sang how the sons of the Achaeans issued from the horse, and sacked the town, breaking out from their ambuscade. He sang how they overran the city here and there and ravaged it, and how Odysseus went raging like Ares along with Menelaos to the house of Deiphobos. It was there that the fight raged most furiously, nevertheless by Athena's help he was victorious. [521] All this he told, but Odysseus was overcome as he heard him, and his cheeks were wet with tears. He wept as a woman weeps when she throws herself on the body of her husband who has fallen before his own city and people, fighting bravely in defense of his home and children. She wails aloud and flings her arms about him as he lies gasping for breath and dying, but her enemies beat her from behind about the back and shoulders, and carry her off into slavery, to a life of labor [ponos] and sorrow, and the beauty fades from her cheeks—even so piteously did Odysseus weep, but none of those present perceived his tears except Alkinoos, who was sitting near him, and could hear the sobs and sighs that he was heaving.

It is significant that Alki‑noos, whose name means 'he whose noos has power', is the one who notices the grief of Odysseus. Alkinoos asks Odysseus a pointed question that keeps the focus on the themes of the Trojan War, the themes of the Iliad:

E) Odyssey viii 567-586: Tell us also why you are made unhappy on hearing about the return of the Argive Danaans from Troy. The gods arranged all this, and sent them their misfortunes in order that future generations might have something to sing about. Did you lose some brave kinsman of your wife's when you were before Troy? A son-in-law or father-in-law—which are the nearest relations a man has outside his own flesh and blood? Or was it some brave and kindly-natured comrade - for a good friend is as dear to a man as his own brother?

Such Iliadic themes, like the 'good friend' (consider Patroklos in the Iliad), are the themes of the Sirens in the Song of the Sirens:

F) Odyssey xii 184-191: 'Come here,' they sang, 'renowned Odysseus, honor to the Achaean name, and listen to our two voices. No one ever sailed past us without staying to hear the enchanting sweetness of our song—and he who listens will go on his way not only charmed, but wiser, for we know all the ills that the gods laid upon the Argives and Trojans before Troy, and can tell you everything that is going to happen over the whole world.'

The nostalgic (love song?) Song of the Sirens, xii 184-191, is replete with Iliadic agenda

So how does noos / nostos lead to orientation? Now we go back to celestial dynamics... returning to the Island Nightmare.

Celestial dynamics: sun sets into the Okeanos (Iliad VIII 485) / and rises from the Okeanos (Odyssey xix 433-434).

Similarly, the psukhē when it leaves the body "sets" into the Okeanos (Odyssey xx 63ff).

G) Odyssey xii 1-7: After we left behind the stream of Okeanos, and had got out into the open sea, we went on till we reached the island of Aeaea, where the Dawn has her dwelling and her place to dance, and where the risings of the sun happen.

Where it all comes together is Odyssey xiii 79-95 the nostos:

H) Odyssey xiii 79-95: Thereon, when they began rowing out to sea, Odysseus fell into a deep, sweet, and almost deathlike slumber. [81] The ship bounded forward on her way as a four-in-hand chariot flies over the course when the horses feel the whip. Her prow curved as it were the neck of a stallion, and a great wave of dark seething water boiled in her wake. She held steadily on her course, and even a falcon, swiftest of all birds, could not have kept pace with her. Thus, then, she cut her way through the water, carrying one who was as cunning as the gods, but who was now sleeping peacefully, forgetful of all that he had suffered both on the field of battle and by the waves of the weary sea. [93] When the bright star that heralds the approach of dawn began to show, the ship drew near to land.