Willpower over Aid

Willpower Over Aid

Getting my grade up from a B to an A is hard, but without my determination and willpower, it is even harder. In fact, it would be impossible. Much like my journey of raising my grade, there are two characters from two different texts who went through a much more arduous journey. In The Odyssey, an epic poem written by Homer, Telemachus, son of King Odysseus of Ithaca goes on a journey to find his father, who has been gone from home for twenty years. Odysseus had fought in the Trojan War alongside the Greeks for the first ten years and spent the other ten years trying to get home. In Enrique’s Journey, a nonfiction book written by Sonia Nazario, Enrique, a Honduran boy, steps out to find his mother Lourdes, who had left to America to find a better life for herself and her children. Both of these journeys required help from others, but mainly their own grit and determination. Although some help from others might be needed along the journey, there can only be success if one is willing.

In order to have a more successful journey, help from others is definitely needed. Just by looking at Telemachus, you can see that help is essential. Even as a grown man, Telemachus can’t do lots of things by himself:

He spread the doors of his snug well-made room, sat down on the bed and pulled his soft shirt off, tossed it into the old woman’s conscientious hands, and after folding it neatly, patting it smooth, she hung it up on a peg beside his corded bed, then padded from the bedroom, drawing the door shut with the silver hook, sliding the doorbell home with its rawhide strap. There all night long wrapped in a sheep’s warm fleece, he weighed in his mind the course Athene charted (I. 497-507)

Telemachus, even when he is pretty much all grown up, still has someone, an old woman, who takes care of him and folds his clothes. When it says he sleeps “wrapped in a sheep’s warm fleece”, it shows that he is still like a baby, and babies need help. Later in the poem, Athena guides Telemachus on his journey and takes him to Nestor and Menelaus to receive more information about where Odysseus might be. Telemachus is afraid to speak to them, so he says, “How can I greet him, Mentor, even approach the king? I’m hardly adept at subtle conversation. Someone my age might feel shy, what’s more interrogating an older man” (III. 24-27). Later, he does end up speaking to both Nestor and Menelaus. However, had he not gotten help from Athena, this would have never happened, and he wouldn’t have gotten any information about Odysseus, making his journey less successful. Now in Enrique’s Journey,