The Odyssey

Due to the fact that Eric's car radio can only receive 2 stations in Niceville and his in house financial adviser advised against purchasing an XM radio and subscription to remedy the situation, he has been listening to audio books on his daily drives.  One of the early books he listened to was Homer's "Odyssey".  He loved it and would often share the exciting events of the day with his family.  The boys, in particular, were captivated by the Cyclops.  Therefore, when I noticed a series based on the Odyssey at our library, I elected to check out the first book conveniently named: "The One-Eyed Giant", and by convenient I mean it was named after the one character the boys had taken an acute interest in.  Another reason I elected to start this series is that the next book in the Magic Tree House series was missing and I jumped at the chance to take a break from that.  We are in the high 30s, and frankly, all of the stories are basically the same.  But, the boys love them, so what are you going to do?  In my case, trick them into reading a new series.

Well, Will wasn't that impressed with the first book, but Dom was hooked and we read the entire story in one sitting.  That evening at dinner we were talking about it with Eric when we realized that neither boy really remembered much about the story except that a one-eyed giant was in it.  Something that could be deduced from the title.  What started as a parental summarization of the story became a play where I got to play the Cyclops and the boys took turns being Odysseus.  Molly filled in where she could.  Eric acted as a ram so that the boys could escape from my cave and we used Molly's Agnes as the wooly back that fooled me into thinking Eric was really a ram.  We all enjoyed the part where I got to throw "boulders"  (pillows) at their "ship" (the couch) as they yelled insults at me.

The next day we checked out the next two books in the series.  The boys wanted to act out the second book, but as it's main story was Odysseus traveling to the land of the dead, there wasn't a lot to work with (for children).  We could have done something with them being turned into pigs...but, chose not to.

On the other hand, the third book had loads of material. It told the stories of Sirens, Scylla and Charybdis, and eating the sacred cattle on the island of the Sun God.  Molly and I played the Sirens as Will played an uninspired Odysseus.  Eric took over and did a much more realistic job.  Next, Molly and I played Scylla (with the aid of dinosaurs, a shark, and an alligator).  Will was back to Odysseus, Dom requested he be one of the crew who doesn't die, and Eric took one for the team.  Finally we made it to the Land of the Sun God (side story, when I read this to Dom he thought about it for a while then said: 'Oh! That's Jesus'.  It took me a second to realize he was thinking Son of God).  Will again played Odysseus and Eric and Dom played the hungry crew.  Molly and I moved cows and sheep around doing wonderful impressions of cow and sheep noises if I do say so myself.  This is where our interpretation went a little awry.  Dom, knowing the consequences of eating any of the sacred animals, refuses to eat as Eric attempts to force it on him.  When we move on to the next part of the story, I will not soon forget the fear and sadness in my son's eyes as the storm strikes their ship and he pleads to let him live because he didn't eat any of the animals.  We take a break from the action to swap roles.  In the new scene, Dom is now Poseidon wreaking havoc on the ship, Will is Odysseus, and Molly and Eric are the ill-fated crewmen.  And everyone is a lot happier for the role changes.

Acting out the stories made these characters much more real for the boys.  Now I will hear them playing the Odyssey.  The neighbor girl is always Penelope, unless she is unavailable, then Molly is given that role.  Will is nearly always Odysseus and Dom is Telemachus.  I am fittingly Odysseus' mother.

The track I've added to this post is a song that we have on Will's birthday CD.  I really love this group, The Okee Dokee Brothers.  And this song fit in perfectly to what we were reading.  If you know the sound of Will's voice, imagine hearing him belt out these lyrics around the house.  I love it.  There is a part where they sing about Odysseus, and Will ran through the house to breathlessly tell me they were singing about Odysseus!  They also sing about Tom Sawyer, which just happened to be the book Eric was reading to the kids at bedtime. 

Next up, we will be reading Peter Pan at night, and I'm back to the Magic Tree House, but at least I got a few weeks reprieve.