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When the Cyclop slept among his goats, Ulysses wanted to draw his sword and thrust it with all his might into the bosom of the sleeping monster; but wiser thought restrained him because he realized that he would need Polyphemus alive as only he could have removed the mass of stone which he had placed to guard the entrance.

Ulysses wrapped himself fast with both his hand in the rich wool of a ram, the fairest of the flock. As the sheep passed the doorway of the cave, the Cyclop who was sitting there at the threshold, felt the back of those fleecy wools, without realizing that they carried his enemies under them. When the last ram came with Ulysses under it, the Cyclop stopped the ram and felt it, and had his hand once in the hair of Ulysses, but did not recognize it.

Ulysses made knots of osier twigs upon which the Cyclop, commonly slept, with which he tied the fattest and fleeciest of the rams together, three in a rank; and under the middle ram he tied a man. Thus the man could escape from the cave along with the ram which was moving towards its accustomed pasture.

Ulysses introduced himself as ‘Ulysses, son of Laertes; he was called the King of Ithaca and a waster of cities’.

When the fellow Cyclops came flocking from all parts to inquire what trouped Polyphemus, Polyphemus answered from within the cave that Noman had hurt him and Noman was with him in the cave. The other Cyclops thought that Polyphemus was alone in the cave ‘and no one had hurt him but he himself. So they went away, thinking that some disease troubled him.

The Cyclops neither sowed nor ploughed, but the earth untilled produced for them rich wheat and barley and grapes. They had neither bread nor wine, nor did they know the arts of cultivation, not cared to know them. They lived each man to himself, without laws or government or anything like a state or kingdom. Their dwellings were in caves on the steep heads of mountains, every man’s household governed by his own caprice or not governed at all. They did not have any ships or boats, no trade or commerce or wish to visit other shores.

The cyclops were giant shepherds who lived on the steep heads of mountains in caves.

Ulysses waited for some time while the Cyclop lay insensible; and heartening up his men, they placed the sharp end of the stake in the fire till it was heated red-hot; and the four men with difficulty bored the sharp end of the huge stake, which they heated red-hot, right into the single eye of the drunken cannibal.

Ulysses, with Chosen party of twelve followers, landed, to explore what sort of men dwelt there, whether hospitable or friendly to strangers or altogether wild and savage.

The Greek wine was so strong that no one ever drank it without an infusion of twenty parts of water to one wine, yet the fragrance of it even then so delicious, that it would have vexed a man who smelled it to abstain from tasting it; but whoever tasted it, it was able to raise his courage to the height of heroic deeds.

The Cyclop took the wine and drank it, and vehemently enjoyed the taste of wine, which was new to him, and swilled gain at the flagon, and entreated for more; and prayed Ulysses to tell him his name, that he might bestow a gift upon the man who had given him such brave liquor. When Ulysses says that this name is Noman, the Cyclop promises Ulysses that he will eat him after he has eaten all of Ulysses’ friends

Ulysses hatched a plot to incapacitate the Cyclop and escape from the cave alive. He chose a stake from among the wood which the Cyclop had piled up for firing, in length and thickness like a mast, which he sharpened, and hardened in the fire; and selected four men, and instructed them what they should do with his stake and made them perfect in their parts.

The cyclop replied nothing, but gripping two of the nearest of Ulysses’ followers as if they had been no more than children, he dashed their brains out against the earth, and tore in pieces their limbs, and devoured them, yet warm and trembling, making a lion’s meal of them lapping the blood.

Ulysses said that they came neither for plunder, nor business, but were Grecians, who had lost their way, returning from Troy. He added that they acknowledged him to be mightier than them, and hence prostrated themselves humbly before his feet.

Ulysses is not happy to perform the ordinary duties of a king mainly because his heart is in voyages beyond horizon. He is bored with the task of enforcing law and order and giving reward and punishment to a savage race.

Ulysses finds Telemachus discerning and prudent. Besides, Ulysses is wearing the crown uneasily as the call for adventure and desire to sail beyond sunset is obsessing his mind. So, he wants to hand over the kingdom to Telemachus.

The speaker addresses the readers in the second part explaining the difference between his roles and that of Telemachus.

Ulysses strongly believes that just breathing is not life. Life has to be adventurous and full of action.

Ulysses yearns for following knowledge like a sinking star beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

“How dull it is to pause, to make an end, To rust unburnished, not to shine in use! 

The lines quoted above convey his quest for travel is unending.

Ulysses has met people hailing from different cultural backgrounds. He has learnt much from their manners, climates, councils and governments. He learnt strategies of warfare in battles.

The sailors and Ulysses may be washed down by the gulfs or they could touch Greek paradise and meet their hero Achilles. They may die happily braving the elements of nature.

Both Ulysses and his fellow sailors are now old. They no more have the strength they possessed in olden days moving earth and heaven. They are made weak by time and fate but strong in will “to strive, to seek, to find and not to yield.” They share the heroic temper and undying quest for knowledge and adventure.

Telemachus would do the work of ruling Ithaca with prudence and tenderness. Ulysses will pursue his dream of adventure and try to meet great Achilles in the other world.

(a) Metaphor

(b) Personification

(c) Metaphor

(d) Metaphor

(e) Metaphor

(f) Metaphor

(g) Synecdoche (part of the whole)

(h) Metaphor

(i) Synecdoche

(j) Metaphor

(k) Metaphor

(l) Allusion (in Greek mythology the place is known as Greek paradise)

(m) Allusion (Greek mythology)

(a) The figure of speech Personification is employed in the above lines.

(b) Metaphor

(c) Metaphor

(d) Personification

(e) Simile

(f) Personification