Max Rose > Recent Status Updates

Seems harder to read than Macbeth was for me but idk, that was a while ago. Act 3—where the four Athenians all meet up and argue—is absolutely brilliant! No wonder we’re still performing it today.

A little hard to understand but I just try to cruise on through. Tons of helpful notes though if you’re so inclined.

Can’t help but laugh at the melodrama of Hermia and Helena. Wonder what original audiences thought.

Whoa! Unexpected plot

Loving this

Thought things might be going off the rails for a bit with Siddhartha pursuing women and business like a finance bro but then it all circled back around nicely to his search for The Truth. Will he find it?

Very easy read but lots to think about.

Captures the internal monologue about spiritual questions really well.

Fascinating. I think I’m gonna love this. Already a ton of banger quotes.

It’s good again!

Almost done! Really like the chapter where everyone competes to string the bow. Whole time I wasn’t quite sure if they meant drawing the bow back with an arrow or literally attaching the string. Once its Odysseus’ turn though, I understood they were all literally straying to attach the string. Hopefully for the movie they take some liberty and instead of stringing the bow they all attempt to “draw the bow”

Almost done! Really like the chapter where everyone competes to string the bow. Whole time I wasn’t quite sure if they meant drawing the bow back with an arrow or literally attaching the string. Once its Odysseus’ turn though, I understood they were all literally straying to attach the string. Hopefully for the movie they take some liberty and instead of stringing the bow they all attempt to “draw the bow”

Everyone is so dramatic in these stories. So much crying, so many kisses, so much talk about how distraught over Odysseus someone is. Lol

Still 100 pages left, wow.

I actually like some of these chapters with the suitors in isolation, it’s just taken some time getting used to the new pace of the story. This last chapter with Odysseus boxing the beggar and taunting the suitors was pretty fun to read tbh.

I wouldn’t say these chapters are useless, but I wish this amount of detail, storytelling, and character building had gone in to the chapters during Odysseus’ journey instead of his return. The famous journey home is all starting to feel like a prelude to all the drama with the suitors, which appears to be the real story Homer wanted to spend time on.

Finally a great chapter again! Loved Odysseus reuniting with Telemachus. They start plotting how to deal with the suitors and I like how Odysseus asks his son for advice or at least some details about the situation. And you can see both their personalities in the plotting too.

One other thing, many times when the swineherd Eumeaus is mentioned, the book will switch to first person as if talking to Eumaeus. Weird.

Much better than the last chapter but most modern books would be using this time to build up to something big and the momentum would really be churning but the Odyssey is really taking its time.

Utterly useless chapter. Odysseus meets up with his swine herd while disguised and when the swine herd asks him who he is and where he came from, Odysseus tells a made up story with nearly as much detail as he did the exciting tales that actually happened! What are we doing here? 4 pages on a alibi that will never come up again?? Bruh.

Ithaca at last!

Kinda crazy all the famous tales at sea are done now and the story’s only half finished. I really hope the stuff with the suitors is worth it because the stories at sea were kinda skimmed over. Total opposite of the Iliad in that regard.

Odysseus puts beeswax in the ears of his sailors so they can’t hear the sirens—so they can ignore them. Is that where “mind your beeswax” comes from? Obviously not as common as “mind your business” but I remember kids that.

Thought it might be a pointless chapter but the conversation Odysseus has with Agamemnon is pretty important foreshadowing (I’m guessing). And overall it makes the story more epic and adds in the lore of other Greek tales which strengthen the Odyssey.

Odysseus seems a bit reckless so far. But he’s brave too and doesn’t leave his men behind so I like that. Circe doesn’t seem like that big of a character but maybe she’s in the next chapter too. I know there’s contemporary book about Circe that’s pretty popular so I wonder what it’s about cuz there’s not much in the Odyssey so far.

Cyclops chapter is predictably great. This movie is gonna be so good

Oh to be shipwrecked in Ancient Greece and wash up on the island of the Phaeacians! Odysseus has been there only a couple days, hasn’t even told them his name(!) and yet they bathed and clothed him, suggested he marry the king’s daughter, threw him a feast, gave him presents, and made a ship ready to take him home.

Scandalous song about Aphrodite and Ares also included in this chapter.

Anytime someone visits another lord in their palace, they always eat and drink first before talking about why the visitor came lol

A bit of a filler chapter. But I anticipate that Odysseus is gonna tell the people he just met the story of his travels and then we’ll see it all as long flashbacks.

Finally with Odysseus! Homer has a strange way of telling his stories. He basically spoils what’s to come. He did this all through out the Iliad and here he’s already said numerous times “all of Odysseus’s men/crew died” lol Not sure why he does that but it must be a product of the time. Cuz I’m pretty sure the next few chapters will be flashbacks. So much easier to read than the Iliad btw.

First mention of the Trojan Horse in chapter 4. Pretty sure it’s not a part of the Odyssey at all and the Aeneid is where the famous tale comes from.

Also very funny from Helen, who’s back with her husband Menelaus after the war: “launching your headlong battles just for my sake, shameless whore that I was” lol

Chapter 3, Telemachus visits Nestor. Sort of a filler chapter tbh. I could see it being cut almost entirely from the Nolan movie. But it also provides some backstory for the other Greek warriors and their own “odyssey’s” returning home from Troy.