michael-dean-k/

Check out "the odyssey" tag (at the bottom) for more posts on my idea to rewrite an alternate version of epic.

The story opens with a modified tale of the cyclops—probably the most memory-scaring monster experience of the whole Odyssey. This typically doesn't come until book 9, which means the framing of the 8 prior chapters changes the significance of this event; the traditional opening sets a frame of a disordered home that can only be restored by Odysseus's return; this opening highlights the protagonist's Faustian curiosity. Venturing onto the cyclops island is his original act of wanderlust; throughout the whole epic, he ventures into forbidden lands, but this is the inciting event that gets him cursed.

But how did he arrive in the land of cyclopses in the first place? The Gods were aggravated with the Greeks—because of how they looted the city, disrespected temples, and pillaged nearby villages—so Poseidon scattered all home-bound fleets in arbitrary directions (while Agamemnon stayed on shore to apologize and make sacrifices). So Poseidon is already pissed, but the cyclops ordeal is what brings the personal vendetta against Odysseus, who is riding the high from victory. He personally conceived the trick to win, the Trojan Horse, and there is nothing his cunningness can't overcome.

The opening line of the original describes Odysseus as being a "polytropic man," but we don't fully see this in action until the cyclops scene... Polytropic is traditionally understood as "many turned," making him a trickster, but he is also multi-desired. He loves the stability of being a king at home, and earnestly wants to return to Penelope and Telemachus, but also harbors an unsatiable thirst for all kinds of knowledge. He thinks he's cunning enough to have both, to venture into forbidden lands, to learn and see what no human has ever experienced, but without sacrificing his normal life. (This is a relatable, timeless tension—the desire to be both ordinary and extraordinary). IMO, the only proper conclusion of the story is to show him failing this juggle. As in the Bible, one cannot eat from the tree of knowledge without consequence.

The whole odyssey stems from his curiosity of the uncanny. He was not forced onto the island. He chose this side quest. Odysseus has never seen a cyclops, only heard of them in lore. How big are they? Are they as rude as they say? He could have easily returned home if he had allowed these questions to remain unanswered. Instead, he thinks he can use his cunningness to form a pact with them, to receive gifts. The larger crew is scared to explore, but a small group wanders out and into the cave of Polyphemus, not knowing it is Poseidon's only surviving son at this point—his other died at Troy. It is not just a normal cyclops (10 feet tall), but being the God of Poseidon and a sea nymph, he’s a 30-footer. They quickly find out that the cyclops is a savage; he ignores Odysseus's request for xenia around guest treatment, and casually eats two members of their crews (to be fair thought, the cyclops did walk in to them raiding his food supply). They get trapped in the cave, blocked in by a massive boulder they can't lift.

As Polyphemus wanders the fields on day 2, they try to plot their escape. The pressure mounts, and some of the crew startw mocking Odysseus, the man who got them in this pickle, the man who conceived of the great Trojan Horse, now fumbling for an escape scheme. Another man notes that no one will believe the fantastical story of Trojan Horse, nor will they believe their story of the 30' cyclops, if they survive. How could they? One jokes to capture the cyclops, hang him from the mast, and return home with the mythic beast (King Kong-style). Another jokes that he's too big to carry, but his penis is only the size of a man. Carryable/draggable. Odysseus insults them and their ideas, suggesting they're drunk, suggesting they might as well take the loose rope around the cave and hang themselves—which hatches his new plan: to get the cyclops drunk, tie him with rope, and castrate him.

This is the founding deviation from the original, and way more extreme, but the mechanics work on many levels. First, the logistical level: After Polyphemus comes back and eats two more men, Odysseus offers him Apollo's wine, 20x the strength, fit to get a cyclops wasted. Polyphemus thanks him, and promises to eat him last (his idea of a gift). He is out cold, vomiting in his sleep, and so the crew takes the opportunity to gather the rope (Polyphemus is a builder/shepherd). They tie down each limb, and most importantly, tie his dominant hand to a rope that is connected to the boulder. One man grabs a rope attached to the cyclops's phallus to hold it in tension, odysseus grabs his sickle, and the others wait by the boulder. In one blow, the cyclops gets dismembered, which shocks him awake. The natural reaction for the cyclops is to cover his groin to stop the bleeding, and this thrust of his arm shimmies the boulder just enough so the men can escape. In the scramble, Odysseus, sees the phallus on a rope, and decides to drags it out, wanting a souvenir to prove their ordeal, a tangible symbol for his cunningness.

On the way out, he reveals his name, "Odysseus," to be known in the land of cyclopes (all soldiers, like Achilles, care most for the immortality of their name). This hubristic act gives away his cover and lets Polyphemus connect the dots: he was warned about this in a prophecy, and so now he pleads to Poseidon to curse him (to either kill him, to kill his crew, or to have him return to unfixable chaos).

The castration is a not a random or lewd replacement for blindness; it deepens the escape on several levels: (1) they are both "one-eyed" (he took the one-eyed monster from the one-eyed monster); (2) this is more painful for Poseidon, since it neuters his only son alive and threatens his bloodline; (3) it is more embarrassing, since cyclopses are uncivilized and unclothed, the others will notice; (4) it is less threatening; Polyphemus would be unable to hunt or survive from blindness, and so castration is actually more humane; and (5) a castration is the foundational act of Greek cosmology; it has an uncanny similarity, fusing Homeric lore with Hesiod's universe.

The myth goes something like this: Gaia (Earth) and Uranus (sky) fuse together and have monstrous/mythical children, which include three cyclopses. But Uranus was so disgusted by them, he banished them to live in caves inside the Earth. This upset Gaia, so she arranged to have the cyclops's father castrated by one of the kids (Saturn, the Titan). Out of the blood of that castration poured many more monsters, nymphs, and goddesses, and the previously caved beings were free to roam. So the castration is symbolic in two ways: (1) it lets the trapped children (Odysseus and his crew) leave the cave, but really (2) it unleashes the wave of monsters, the same ones Odysseus is about to encounter; the origin myth includes nymphs, giants, multi-headed sea monsters, and Aphrodite (a sex goddess who spawns from the blood and foam of the severed penis in the ocean... to jump ahead briefly, after his ship sinks, the cyclops penis sinks with it, and his next encounter is Calypso, strikingly similar to Aphrodite, a sex goddess of the ocean who deceives with desire).

The chapter ends with the six-foot cyclops phallus skewered onto the bowsprit of a ship (the already phallic spike at the front). It sets the whole sexual/subconscious angle of the story: they are following their genitals, which isn't limited to sex, but the Faustian impulse to go beyond convention to know what should remain unknown.