The Growth of Telemachus

Created by: Mia Bonner and Morgan Vicknair

As telemachus sits among the suitors with a grieving heart, he dreams of his father coming home. He is immature, full of grief and immature, which is understandable given he’s young and lets his emotions get the best of him. An example of him being disrespected is in book 1 lines 440-443, where Antinous is mocking him because he’s a young boy who tries to act high and mighty. This angers telemachus because the suitors don't respect him even though he is the princes of their country and is in most ways more powerful than them. Telemachus was a young boy who had to fill the big shoes of his father. This has caused him to appear to be cocky not knowing how to handle that amount of power, responsibility, and dealing with the arrogant suitors. Book 2 line 370 shows that the suitors and other high ranked nobles thought telemachus was full of himself and didn't respect him. On page 81 lines 132-33 “First by far to see her was Prince Telemachus, sitting among the suitors, heart obsessed with grief” shows how he ached for his father.  

In these books we witness a change in Telemachus’ character since books 1-4.Telemachus is also more mature, commanding, and its apparent that he cares about the well being of his mother. An influence of this change, between book 4 and 20, was Athena appearing to him as mentor and guiding him to be more confident around the suitors and stand up to them. She also guided him to take a journey in search of news for his father. This gave him a sense of self importance and allowed him to mature. He is more mature and stands up to the suitors in defence of his father, although, in our culture a son commanding him mother is disrespectful, this wasn't the belief during this time. Book 21, line 382-390, demonstrates telemachus taking control of the household and standing up to the suitors. As it says in book 21 line 130, “Id even take a crack as the bow myself... If i string it and shoot it through all the axes, I’d worry less if my noble mother left our house with another man and left me behind...” This shows that Telemachus now respects his mother and doesn't want her to leave the palace behind with another husband.  On page 421 line 371, it is clear that Telemachus has now matured.Agelaus encourages Telemachus to help his mother make decisions and help her through difficult times, since he is now mature enough to do so.
“So go, Telemachus, sit with your mother, coax her to wed the best man here...”

From a young squirt,

to a mature young adult