I recently read Homer's The Odyssey translated by Robert Fitzgerald. I was astounded by the violence at the epic poem's end. Ulysses slaughters the suitors that have been courting his wife in his absence in the most relentless and unforgiving manner. I felt sympathy for the suitors, which are not, in any way, characters that Homer compels the reader to feel sympathy with (the suitors have stolen Odysseus' cattle and siphoned away the resources of his estate, while trying to convince Penelope that marrying one of them would be a good move). Then, Odysseus end up in a fight with many of the most prestigious families in Ithaka, because the suitors were members of these families, and Odysseus has murdered them in cold blood. Odysseus is ready to repeat the same kind of slaughter that the suitors experienced, when Athena, that motherly and caring friend of Odysseus, steps in at Zeus' urging to stop the battle.
Odysseus' bloodlust made me think about his possible post-traumatic stress from his years at war and all the traumatic incidents and deaths he witnessed while trying to get back home. Is Odysseus so used to reacting violently and without control, as being in battle can bring out in a soldier, that he is now unable, when provoked, to control his blood lust at home?
I talked to a friend of mine who is a classical scholar about the evidence of Odysseus having undiagnosed -- of course undiagnosed, because the term hadn't been invented -- post-traumatic stress, and he told me that scholars have examined this link. I am interested in finding out more about this connection between Homer and the phenomenon of post-traumatic stress.
