RadixJournal - October 01, 2026


The Odyssey： Book 9-12

Hosted by
Richard Spencer
Mentioned
Odysseus Cersei Chris Christopher Nolan Shakespeare Odyssey Thrinassia Hector Fagel Homer
Enthusiastic Consent

Episode Stats


Length

15 minutes

Words per minute

133.87

Word count

2,075

Sentence count

27

Harmful content

Misogyny

5

sentences flagged

Toxicity

6

sentences flagged

Hate speech

6

sentences flagged


Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 okay um a lot of interesting things going on
00:00:06.000 um this was an action-packed few chapters uh we read nine through twelve uh so we are halfway
00:00:16.400 through the book we have odysseus who's been released from calypso's island and he is among
00:00:23.200 the phaesians is that how we're pronouncing it close enough that might very well be a reference
00:00:31.840 to the phoenicians which is very interesting and we we meet a bard among these phoenician-like
00:00:40.320 people and finally at the beginning of chapter nine odysseus reveals himself he is the the great
00:00:50.800 fighter the mastermind the sacker of cities and then we go into this section where odysseus
00:00:58.400 himself becomes the bard and is narrating the story for the phaeaeans and um so there there's
00:01:08.860 a lot of twists and turns in the odyssey just in terms of narrative structure it's by no means some
00:01:17.440 you know beginning middle end straightforward story it has these bookends and embedded stories
00:01:25.560 different narrators it's quite complex in that sense um that was probably something that appealed
00:01:33.900 to Christopher Nolan and there are a lot of very as I said famous scenes um there is the trip to
00:01:46.320 the cyclops the polyphemus which is narrated by osisius and um they make it out of there somehow
00:01:55.360 alive there's the scene of uh odysseus telling the cyclops that he is no one i believe that
00:02:02.800 we're the name in greek is um udis um which basically it sounds a lot like no one and um
00:02:11.040 so after they poke the cyclops eye out he's screaming that no one is attacking me and his
00:02:16.920 fellow cyclopses cyclopses are none the wiser and Odysseus really can't help himself but announce
00:02:27.580 who he is to the cyclops out of pride or fighting spirit a desire to be recognized I mean it's a
00:02:36.100 it is interesting in terms of characterization where there is the um the i am no one i am this
00:02:43.060 crafty man of lies and mask and then there is the pride killies like pride of announcing yourself
00:02:50.580 boldly um that causes uh quite a few problems um they then travel to a another realm where
00:03:02.100 they meet aeolus sort of legendary king of with 12 children six boys and six girls they marry one
00:03:10.180 another and he is the king of the winds and uh he offers a bag of winds for odysseus so that he can
00:03:22.180 uh navigate home to Ithaca safely and uh of course his reckless crewmates open up the bag
00:03:32.480 they think it's plunder they had already sacked another city and got in some loot and um you know
00:03:40.000 we are the sea people is in the Nolan version but uh they thought there was more booty in the bag
00:03:46.920 they of course release the winds and he he travels back to aeolus and he is very worried you know if
00:03:53.540 you're this unlucky the gods must be against you and i don't want to be a part of that and uh then
00:04:00.900 there's a uh a traveling to cerci who's a fascinating character very very different than
00:04:08.060 this sort of disappointed and resentful feminist we met in in nolan's movie but she has a stone 0.96
00:04:14.300 palace and a golden throne um but similarly she turns the shipmates into pigs and uh i mean i'll 0.95
00:04:24.620 i'll get your opinion on this mark and then the opinion of the group as well but i i do think 1.00
00:04:29.740 that there is a modern notion of chauvinist pigs going on uh she is a uh a dangerous female nolan 0.98
00:04:39.980 emphasize this and you know you act like pigs so you should be one yourself and uh I I do think 1.00
00:04:48.420 that that was a fairly accurate capturing of one of the sentiments in one of these dark female 1.00
00:04:56.720 proto-feminist I guess you could say if you want to uh depictions of of Cersei and um and then 0.98
00:05:05.820 Hermes actually helps out Odysseus and he picks a plant that's very dangerous for mortals to pick
00:05:12.420 Mole and uh this will counteract the spell so that it's very you know Odysseus is Hermes's
00:05:20.280 great grandson and Hermes is helping him out helping him get home so it's very Hermes will
00:05:25.920 recur come back again with Calypso um so it's very very interesting that relationship and and also
00:05:33.180 the the way that you can guard against these dark feminine characters and uh so her so excuse me
00:05:41.260 Odysseus is not uh taken in by the spell but he sort of is and they they spend a year on Circe's 0.99
00:05:49.820 island and uh Odysseus goes to bed with Circe uh many times she anoints him with oil and he begs her
00:05:58.940 for their release and so on and um she actually uh talks she tells him that they have to travel to
00:06:08.780 the underworld by ship and that she'll give them a magic she'll give them a magical wind to get
00:06:14.940 them there and they have to meet uh uh to rate uh tiresias who is the uh a blind prophet from
00:06:23.760 thieves and he will be able to help them home and they meet a number of they have a number
00:06:32.240 of encounters in this sort of liminal underworld realm uh including odysseus's mother and um
00:06:42.720 some other one of the uh the uh a phenor um elfenor excuse me the a sort of reckless coward
00:06:52.320 who fell off a roof at cersei's ballast and they they meet other people that minos is a curious
00:06:58.400 character i was going to ask you about mark and uh they also meet achilles and there's a famous
00:07:04.080 exchange that i think we can read uh aloud and um they they learn that they um will will have to
00:07:14.160 get home uh they have to first stop off at um uh Thrinassia island um which is an island that
00:07:25.560 contains Helios's the sun god the titan uh his cattle his sacred cattle and um they learn when
00:07:35.200 they return to Circe after they travel to the underworld um she tells Odysseus about what is
00:07:41.200 going to happen in terms of some of these adventures along the way and these are probably
00:07:46.900 the most iconic things and the Odyssey may be second behind stringing the bow but they will
00:07:54.920 pass by the sirens and Cersei has a way for Odysseus to hear the siren song without being
00:08:03.020 taken in by them just through the power of music and seduction and he's bound to the mask while
00:08:11.180 his to the mast excuse me while his shipmates are uh fill their ears with beeswax and so he
00:08:18.540 basically experiences this immense pleasure while his shipmates do not uh but it becomes a sort of
00:08:25.900 pleasure and pain because he's drawn to them they they sing that no one who passes passed by us in
00:08:32.780 a black ship can ever resist not going home in effect and um what exactly is going on there i
00:08:40.060 think there is a sort of dark feminine um vaginal like quality to all of these things um also when
00:08:50.140 they pass by silla and uh charybdis uh charybdis is an underwater monster that creates these massive
00:08:58.620 whirlpools multiple times a day and he actually doesn't tell his crewmates about cilia or silla
00:09:06.540 who is in a cavern again this sort of dark feminine realm uh 12 legs six heads and she
00:09:17.140 takes away six crewmen maybe there's some numerology going on there but um they finally
00:09:24.940 do arrive on uh threnassia island and uh they will as we know eventually uh or his crewmates
00:09:34.760 will eventually eat from the sacred herd of Helios
00:09:38.620 and that will result in only Odysseus arriving home
00:09:43.240 and arriving home as a broken man
00:09:45.960 with a great struggle before him.
00:09:49.880 So a lot happened in these four chapters.
00:09:54.020 So that's a basic rundown.
00:09:56.860 Hopefully that brought to mind things that you've read
00:09:59.900 and hopefully also kind of set up some
00:10:04.760 uh some you know metaphor symbols and themes that we can talk about but um do you have anything to
00:10:13.260 add to that mark or no uh okay yeah no it's it's well described i mean a lot of the the action
00:10:24.560 actually happens in this section uh that we that we are familiar with or that we remember
00:10:30.520 the sirens the cyclops and to richard's point there's a lot of repetition of the sinister
00:10:37.860 feminine i guess you could call it um in variations of sirens you could say circe in some ways is a
00:10:45.680 siren calypso becomes a siren as well um so the the seductive yet dangerous femme fatales of
00:10:53.920 ancient greek mythology i suppose we could start with the cyclops sort of start at the beginning
00:10:59.460 of these adventures as they're described by Odysseus.
00:11:04.260 Real quick, Chris has a question.
00:11:06.280 Do you want to jump in here, Chris?
00:11:08.640 Just quickly.
00:11:09.340 Yeah, Chris, please.
00:11:09.960 Oh, thanks.
00:11:10.560 Yeah, just quickly.
00:11:11.100 I thought we'll probably get to this later anyway.
00:11:12.880 But I did find it interesting that when I was reading the Fagel's translation, it might
00:11:16.960 be rendered differently elsewhere, but the sirens are never explicitly identified as
00:11:23.400 women or even human for that matter. 0.99
00:11:25.840 I think the sort of the dark feminine reading, I think, is definitely right. I think it's the correct interpretation. I'm not disagreeing with that, but I think it's important to point out that it is an interpretation. They're not explicitly identified as maidens the way they're often depicted and thought of. 1.00
00:11:39.920 yes well I would say in most all of Homer there's a lack of descriptions you have
00:11:46.840 repeated and powerful epithets like the lustrous braided Circe it's braids that's sort of all we
00:11:57.640 learn about her and we don't really know what her palace is like it's a stone palace
00:12:04.620 the Fagels uses the translation of palace uh very different from the cottage in Christopher Nolan's
00:12:13.140 work but there's not a vivid description of Helen of Troy as well there's white-armed Helen of Troy
00:12:19.020 gray or bright-eyed blue-eyed Athena there it's there's a lot of I guess it's a Homer reminds me
00:12:28.620 a lot of Shakespeare I mean Shakespeare's a play obviously but there's a lot of bold
00:12:33.040 characterization in the action and in the dialogues and so on there are these larger
00:12:40.660 than life characters like Odysseus or Achilles and Hector and you know etc but there there aren't
00:12:48.980 that sort of novelistic descriptions where we really know what these things are Askelia is
00:12:54.740 another one this a monster that even the gods dread looking upon okay I guess it leaves it to
00:13:02.180 There are other clues outside of Homer, though.
00:13:07.000 In early Greek art, they're also depicted as harpies, so the female-faced birds, essentially.
00:13:15.000 So they're given a feminine identity in Greek art.
00:13:18.660 At some point, it's decided in the Greek art and religion that they have a feminine identity.
00:13:25.520 Now, was that true?
00:13:26.960 Was that what Homer was thinking when he was writing The Odyssey?
00:13:30.080 That's something I'd have to look into.
00:13:31.560 Maybe there's evidence that would point to this idea that they were understood as feminine, or there's speculation that they're feminine, or intended as feminine forces, essentially.
00:13:44.540 And maybe part of the clue there is etymological.
00:13:50.260 Cersei herself, Cersei describes them just as creatures in saying what they do.
00:13:56.580 Just missing that.
00:13:58.800 Interesting.
00:13:59.440 i i guess we're just going with this you know sinister feminine the femme fatale
00:14:07.900 which just it seems to just envelop the middle of the odyssey and so it's hard not to think of
00:14:17.540 them as women i mean it the it's that dionysian temptation as well of you know experiencing
00:14:28.560 endless sex and bliss and forgoing your obligations and forgoing home i mean i i think
00:14:38.200 there's something that that is the the dark feminine on some very basic level um you know
00:14:45.600 i was going to talk about this later but since we're just on this subject um and i don't this
00:14:52.220 is definitely not rim analysis or anything but uh there's an interesting section in adorno and
00:15:01.300 horkheimer's in like um dialectic of enlightenment uh where they focus in on this story and you know
00:15:10.240 i i don't know if they're trying to say that this was the intent of homer i doubt that i
00:15:17.240 I think they're sort of using it as a metaphor, a Marxian metaphor for bourgeois society.
00:15:25.800 So you have this amazing...