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J. Marks. Zeus in the Odyssey. washington, D.C.: Center for Hellenic studies, 2008. Dist. by Harvard University Press. vii + 175 pp. Paper, $16.95.
J. Marks sheds much needed light on the neglected subject of Zeus in the Odyssey. In the first three chapters, Marks shows how Zeus does the poet's work of direction and exclusion. To begin with, Marks argues for Zeus' centrality to the epic's plot. At key junctures the chief god delineates the poem's story. in reminiscing on Aigisthos' fate, that is, in presenting his own oresteia (Od. 1.32-43), Zeus "foreshadows the relationships among the Odyssey's characters and the path the narrative will take" (34). in a speech in Book 5 (Od. 5.29-42), he outlines the course of the narrative from Books 5 to 13. Fittingly, only Zeus can bring the poem to a close as he declares the need for a truce between odysseus and his fellow ithakans that short-circuits the possibility of an endless cycle of retributive violence. Moreover, throughout the Odyssey, Zeus not only sees to it that Athena and Poseidon serve his aims unwittingly but also weaves together the different narratives urged by these competing gods to create a coherent story. Marks' discussion can be paired with Bruce Heiden's recent analysis of Zeus' control over the plot of the Iliad (Homer's Cosmic Fabrication: Choice and Design in the Iliad [oxford 2008]).
Marks has a second goal in chapters 1 through 3. He finds that the Odyssey uses Zeus' scenes to confront other stories about its protagonists and to declare thereby its Panhellenic orientation. For example, "the Odyssey targets stories about an unfaithful Penelope for 'de-authorization'," and Zeus' erasure of klytemnestra in his oresteia "signposts this program" (27). when Zeus brings the Odyssey to a close, he "de-authorizes a family of traditions ... in which the suitors' families seek vengeance and drive odysseus into exile" (63). Analogously, it is in a speech by Zeus that a poet can move between two different versions of skheria's fate. Depending on the politics of his audience, a poet could choose in verse 13.158 to have Zeus either allow Poseidon to cover skheria with a mountain by using meta or mega or stop Poseidon from doing so by using me.
In the second...