Book 22 was a crazy book to read for me. It was expected, inevitable, but still upsetting. Instead of a hero mowing down fighting suitors in glorious combat like in some cartoon, I feel like it was more of a depiction of Odysseus striking down, one by one, defenseless, begging, miserable suitors in a fit of rage. Eurymachus is the very first to plead with him, offering wealth and loyalty, claiming to not even blame Odysseus for his rage. Odysseus kills him. Later, Leodes begs for mercy as well, expressing how he is an innocent suitor, not to be lumped in with the others. Odysseus kills him. Phemius then comes up to Odysseus and begs for mercy on the grounds that he's just a singer. Odysseus would have killed him in a heartbeat if it weren't for Telemachus' interjection only then telling him who he shouldn't be killing. Fairly rotten planning there, I guess.
Odysseus feels much more like a villain in this book than a hero. His boasting, all-or-nothing attitude, and merciless sword don't make him the most compelling of characters in this scene. He could have diffused the entire situation by exposing himself as Odysseus, perhaps killing the suitors that he truly felt deserved to die, and harshly threatening all of the rest. He's already a legend, a heroic story told to everyone about the fall of Troy, a formidable figure, not to mention a king. His threat would probably be worth quite a lot to these men. The death toll required to get Odysseus home is easily in the hundreds by this point.
The suitors did not have my sympathy, that much is for certain. But neither did Odysseus really by this point, and it was also the first time that I felt that Athena's help was really unnecessary. The battle was completely rigged and still Odysseus pretended numerous times that the suitors had some sort of other option. They suitors never really got a chance to defend their actions, which I would have actually been interested in reading.
Am I cutting the suitors too much slack? I feel like I kind of did that a bit in my last post. It's fun contemplating the other side of the fight, and this was certainly a very good chapter for it.
Leodes is maybe the most disturbing of these, as he's not lying when he claims that he's had qualms about the suitors--we see him express these in the previous book. It's not to say he's totally innocent, and there is a definite guilt-by-association going on here (i.e. we don't talk about Antinous or Eurymachus as villains but "the suitors" as an undifferentiated group). The logic of mass guilt is troubling to our modern ethical/legal sensibilities, but I would point out that it is also the logic of war, and Odysseus is a warrior. He sacks Troy, and (20 yrs later) returns to sack his own palace.
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