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Overall, the destruction that occurs during this homecoming suggests that war is so destructive to the world and family order that it rends the cosmos. The pre-war home cannot be reconstructed.
In contrast, Homer shows a home that can be rebuilt. Unlike "Agamemnon," Odysseus returns to an Ithaca that does not appear to be happy on the surface. But while Agamemnon's home appeared to be happy to the general, it was a fiction created by his wife so she could avenger her daughter. Odysseus' palace is overrun with suitors, vying for the hand of Penelope, his wife. But while Clytemnestra uses her cleverness to trick her husband, Penelope uses her cleverness to trick the suitors. Throughout much of the first few books of the "Odyssey," Odysseus' son Telemachus is shown, trying to find out information about his father's mysterious absence. The wife and son of Odysseus never give up on the king, and remain loyal to the last. Ultimately, the goddess Athena stands by Odysseus, and ensures that he can recreate his home, as he kills all of the suitors and establishes a new relationship...
This is symbolized by his return to the marital bed that he carved with his own hands for Penelope, and his remembering the 'secret' of the bed.
Thus, although Odysseus, like Agamemnon, labors under a curse because of his wartime actions, after Odysseus has fulfilled his wanderings, though his own wit and the help of the gods, the general is able to return to his destination and his power as a king, husband, and father. Agamemnon's invocation of displeasure on the part of his family and the gods, however, from both before, during, and after the Trojan War, in Aeschylus, cannot create a similarly happy scene of return. Once war has destroyed what existed before, in the eyes of Aeschylus, though not of Homer, the pieces of family and kingdom cannot be reassembled.
Works Cited
Aeschylus. "Agamemnon." From The Greek Tragedies. Edited by David Grene and Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992.
Homer. "The Odyssey." Translated by Richmond Lattimore. New York: Perennial Classics, 1999.
Works Cited
Aeschylus. "Agamemnon." From The Greek Tragedies. Edited by David Grene and Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992.
Homer. "The Odyssey." Translated by Richmond Lattimore. New York: Perennial Classics, 1999.
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