Poly¡tlrentus It ,-9 pay attenton to these clifferenccs, we can perhaps learn solnethirtg about the Odyssey's ìncluiry into the origins of human identity and the relationship of I iclentity to clesire. \sy'<¿u Narnirtg and ldentity Polyphemus We can begin vzith that most basic indicator of identity, the Cyclops' name. For q,hen does Polyphemus become Polyphemusì Wher-r is Polyphemus rramedl The Blinding of a Cyclops Within book 9, the t'rame of this Cyclops, Poly-pherruu, cloes t'rot aPPear until after his blinding by Oclysseus, ancl it is far from clear that it even aPPears as a name at this point in the poem. At t¡.4o3 we hear the word Polypltenu.s uttered for the first time, r,hen the blinded Cyclops has just called out for help, Prompt- ing a surpr:ised respouse from the other Cyclopes. The plot of the Odyssey depends on a single act of its hero: the blinclìng of the 'l'inrs rcloov, IIo)'ú çr1¡L', åq¡pévoc fo ò' ðpóqocg Cyclops. For the blinding cre¿rtes the cosmic opposition betweer.r Poseidon and vúxta òtl ripB¡¡ooír1v, xcì, r:tünvouE lippe tí0¡o0cl the rest of tlie grcls that is responsible for the series of delays in arriving at (od' e.aq-a) lthaca that are the poem-the loss of Odysseus' crew) the suffering of t]re liero, [Why Polyphemos, wliat do you want with all this outcry the prolongecl attempt to regain his power in Ithaca. Odysseus, at the begin- through the immortal night and have macle us all thus sleeplessl] ning of the poem, propels himself into a space between two women who prom- ise to satisfy his desires (Penelope and Calypso). But this space, the space of the 'Ihis is the first time that the word Polyphemus is associated with this Cyclops. jourrley itselt is opened up b1, ¿¡61 linked to his encounter with the Cyclops. Only after the fellow Cyclopes call this cjut is the :nat:ne Polyphemus applied to The Cyclops' anger at the loss of his own eye, foliowed by the Cyclops' curse the single Cyclops blindecl by Odysseus (r).4o7, 446). By colltrast) within his on Odysseus, does not give Odysseus the object of his desire (Ithaca, hrs oikos, narrarive Odysseus never calls the Cyclops he blinds Polyphemus; in the run Penelope), but it does give liim the space to desire those missing objects. It al- up to the blinding, he always addresses him as "Cyclops." This suggests that lows Odysseus not to have what he wants and thus to continue to desire it. Odysseus is reacting to the single eye in the middle of the forehead of his ad- But rather than goirlg directly to Oclysseus' feelings and motivations in this versary. There is thus an important change in the nomenclature of the Cyclops encounter-the well-trodden path that involves trying to make sense out of within Odyssey 9: before the blinding, Odysseus' adversary is a Cyclops; after the hero's motives and ultimate ethical responsibility for the blinding-I pro- the blinding, he is callecl Polyphemus.' pose instead to look at the blinding from the perspective of its victim. For the We should look more closely at the words of surprise utterecl by the Cy- critical emphasis on Odysseus might cause us to overlook the genuinely trau- clopes in response to tlìe cry for help from the fellow member of their species. 'We matic consequences of the blincling on the Cyclops. can in part follow the Why are the Cyclopes so surprised by this cry for helpl The tnost convincing lead of critics who see this episode as a stran€le perversion of the rituals of ex- answer is that they have never before heard such a cry from another Cyclops. change. But the exchange is less one of objects than of loss itself; the episocle Indeecl, why should they havel Odysseus, as narrator) has gone 1o some lengths stages acts of "negative reciprocity" that are llevertheless procluctive because to describe their self-sufficiency, which suggests that they never need help. 'I-he they set clesire ir.r motion. Cyclops loses an eye, which will never return to Their surprise produces the narning of the Cyclops. \Ve witness the mometrt him, and is consecluently given a desire for this lost object by Odysseus. when an adjectival cluster (poly-phenun) is first associated with tlie blincled Odysseus, in exchange, gets the deferred desire for Penelope and his father- Cyclops: the Cyclopes essentially call out, "Why on earth, Polyphemus, 'chat- iand. The ellcounter means raclically different things to each party, and if we terbox,' 'man of much speeclt,' are you sltoutingl" The cluster is only then --- I 20 { rhe Limits of Heroism Polypltemtu }t ,, grafted, by the narrator odysseus, as a name onto a referent: the helpless, bing Oclysseus,+ so, too, the monadic community of ones is destroyed, as the blinded Cyclops. The Cyclopean surprise is a reaction to the first attempt at blindness leacls the Cyclops to begin to forge a link with the fellow members of communication by one of their number, a breaking of a perennial Cyclopean his species. The blinding thus anticipates a future when the Cyclopes will no silence. Their rude awakening by the blinded Cyclops is evidence not merely of longer be self-sufficient ones, alone on their separate mountaintoPs. a clisturbed night's sleep but of an awakening from a much longer sleep. For The blinding of the Cyclops, tlìe removal of his central eye, destroys his Odysseus' tale stages both the first baptism of a Cyclops and, simultaneously, wholeness and introduces him to a world beyond his previous self-sufficiency. the Cyclopes' entrance as a species into the realm of linguistic exchange.' An external negariviry-in the shape of Odysseus ¿s Qu¡is-is transferred, in 'We The crucial point here is that we need not assume that the blinded Cyclops' the act of blinding, into the center of the Cyclops. can now see further sig- plea for help is evidence of prior "minimal civilizatir¡n norms."l For this as- nificance in tlie new name of the Cyclops; because he has lost his one eye, he is sumption cannot help us explain the surprise exhibited in their words at no longer a Kukl-ops. His former singular identity as a monadic being is de- 9.4oj-4.Rather than repudiating the v¿ords of the narrating Odysseus about stroyed at the moment he is introduced into the realm of language. Though he the Cyclopes, we should take them at face value. is now a person "of much speech" (po/yphemos), there is as yet nothing posi- tive we call say about him-though we can) at least, say what he is not. He is roîolv ô'oüt' åyogci, [ìou),,r1qóqoL oüte 0é¡lLoteq. no longer one-eyed and thus is not a Cyclops. åI)"'oi y'úçr1Àôv óqétov vaíoutl xriqrlvcr 'We are now in a better position to reassess the significance of the name ðv onéoor yi,,aqu=ooîol, Oeploteúul ôù öxcoroE Polyphemus. For scholars have noticed the appropriatelless of the meaniug naiôcov r'1ò' ôÀóXrov, oú ò' õr?,,hil"orv &Àéyouor. "much fame," inasmuch as the blinding portrayed in Odys.sey 9 will provide (9.rrz r5) Polyphemus (and Odysseus) wlth kleos (fame).t We shouid be more precise. Polyphemus' access to kleos ð,epends on his prior entrance to language, and this [These people have no institutions, no meetings for counsels; rather they make their habitations in caverns hollowed in turn is dependent on his loss of his eye.6 Here, by way of contrast) we can among the peaks of the high mountains) and each one is the 1aw make use of Lynn-George's analysis of kleos in the lliad. For Lynn-George, for his own wives and children, and cares nothing about the others.] the crucial question of the lliad is to what extent kleos helps balance the in- evitability of loss. Lynn-George comments on the "language of Achilles" in Before Odyssey 9, the Cyclopes are perfectly monadic. They are a species of Iliad 9: ones who ale self-sufficient and whose self-sufficiency makes communication unnecessary. This all changes when a certain unnamed Cyclops (though they In the space of . þhe] siler.rce fof achilles' language] the epic produces a are all unnamed, part of a species that has no need of names) meets Odysseus statement which profoundly questions the conclitions of its possibility as well in his guise as Outis, "No one." After this meeting) in response to a cry for as its worth. Hence it is here, beyond the limits of a restricted economy, be- help, they no longer are heedless of each other. The phrase that once applied yond the achievements of plunder ancl the acquisition of possessions, that the to them-oùô' dtrÀ.rilorv ùÀ.éy [they care nothing for each other]-no language of Achilles finally confronts and tests the limits of language, life, longer applies. In response to his blinding, one Cyclops resorts to an attempt to and the music of the lyre-by cluestioning, implicitly, in relation to man's communicate with the others) which in turn functions as an attempt to gain mortality, the possibility of any meaningful form of immortality in song, au "song" "language to silence in the sail- help in healing his recent wound, the loss of his single eye. epic which this of Achilles" threatens as a in celebration: c{oes- The Cyclopes are one-dimensional beings and thus have no need for com- ing for home.