Deciphering the Odyssey

[fluffypillow]

In a college class of mine I have to write a midterm paper on a passage from the Odyssey. Everyone was assigned a certain passage, and was told to analyze it. I'm not asking for people to do my work for me, I'm just having a hard time looking at this passage past face value. Here it is:

 

When Odysseus and Penelope are reunited, he says to her:

 

Dear woman… We have still not reached the end

Of all our trials. One more labor lies in store__

Boundless, laden with danger, great and long

And I must brave it from start to finish.

So the ghost of Tireisias prophesied to me, 

The day that I went down to the House of Death

To learn our best route home, my comrades and my own.

But come, let’s go to bed, dear woman-at long last

Delight in sleep, delight in each other come!  (Odyssey 23.282-292)

 

I must write about what it means for Odysseus to go home, and what it suggests about the meaning of home. As well as what it says about the role of trials in human life.

 

The first thought that comes to mind for me is when Odysseus is told that he must spread worship of Poseidon to places where people have never seen an oar. Technically speaking, he has to go to cultures who have never seen oceans and seas and tell them of Poseidon. Which is what I believe he is referring to in terms of his one final labor. Quite honestly, that's all I pick up from this passage, and at this rate, I'm in trouble. Any interpretations you have that differ from mine? I only ask for guidance, not for the work to be done for me.