“Tell me, Muse, of the man of many ways, who was driven far journeys,
After he had sacked Troy's secret citadel.
Many were they whose cities he saw, whose minds he learned of,
Many the woes he suffered in his spirit upon the wide sea,
Struggling for his own life and the homecoming of his companions.

”Odysseus the Cunning, Odysseus of the Many Ways, a quick-witted trickster who
outsmarted kings, monsters, and gods. It is no wonder, for in his veins flowed the blood
of Hermes, god of thieves, merchants, travelers, and of all those who survive thanks to
their quick thoughts, and equally quick tongues and hands.
Nevertheless, he was just as wise as he was cunning, and never rejoiced in war or
bloodshed, nor was he ill-tempered, prone to anger, or greedy as many other heroes of old.
Curiosity though...that hunger, that thirst for knowledge is something that plagues the
smart and the wise. Perhaps it is the deepest force within them. Perhaps I should say that
the curious are those who become smart and wise in time.

Yet what happens to them, once their life is consumed, leaving their curiosity still
unsated?
They long to know, explore, and witness the world beyond the world.
This, I think, is what pushes Odysseus forward through Hell.
He ruled as the rightful king of Ithaca, but he cares little for power.
No, his mind needs far greater supremacy over the things around him. He seeks to
understand them.
Driven by his curiosity, he wanders now these demonic landscapes, striving for Lucifer's
seat only to access knowledge forbidden to anyone but gods.
Once again, he leaves his beloved Penelope behind, yet she fears no more, for he has
already returned once against all odds, and she knows he will again.

Life

Odysseus, king of Ithaca, son of Laertes and Anticlea, grandson of the famous thief and
orator Autolykos, who was in turn a mortal son of the god Hermes, whence his skillful
hands and quick tongue came.
Odysseus sailor, hunter, warrior, trickster, honorable only when it was smart to be,
dishonorable, but only when it was necessary to act so.
A complicated figure and a complex man.

Until the Achaeans forced him to take part in a war for which he cared not, he led the life
of a Greek king: he hunted, fought, ruled, and fathered two sons.
Unlike many other kings, he was not interested in bloodshed and revenge. He was always
too wise for that.
Just like them, unfortunately, he was bound by pacts and treaties, and he had to answer
the call when issued. Oh, he did try to convince the envoy that he had gone insane,
sawing salt on the sand and plowing the beach of Ithaca, dressed as a madman...but he
could not drive the plow over the body of his son, and the men of the embassy found
him out. After that, he used his wits to keep the war as short as possible.
He was the one seeing through Thetis' deceit when she tried to prevent her young
Achilles from joining the army, because he knew they needed him.
He was the one counseling, soothing, and reprimanding the bickering cluster of boasting
kings that the Greeks called “an alliance”, keeping them from jumping at each other's
throat at the slightest offense.
He was the one devising the wooden horse that ensured the Greeks' victory after a ten-
year fruitless siege.
And he wanted none of that.
He wanted to go home, to his beloved Ithaca, his wonderful wife, and his two sons.

Fate had something else in store for him. He lived in a time of gods and monsters, and
more often than not, they were one and the same. He blinded Polyphemus, a cruel
Cyclops feeding on the men of his crew, and the monster begged his divine father, none
other than Poseidon himself, to curse the mortal who had bested him.
A sailor on his way home, cursed by the very god of the sea. You can imagine how hard
that journey might have been.

A timeless masterpiece of unattainable beauty has been written about it. If you want to
know more, I suggest you abandon yourself to the verses of the Odyssey. It will be time
well spent.

Regalia

Odysseus rarely needed more than his unmatched cleverness and sweet tongue to obtain
what he wanted, but when he did need more, he could rely on his physical prowess too.
He was, after all, blessed with divine blood.
One object, in particular, showed his unnatural strength: his bow.
Of all the suitors who had invaded his home to court his wife, believing her to be a
widow and trying to gain a regal title by marrying her, none could string it, let alone draw
it.
It was by using that bow that he revealed who he was to the swine who had sullied his
house, and it was with that bow that he hunted them down, those pigs who had
tormented her woman for years.