Worn out and sick at heart, tasting our grief. (Homer, page 864)

With the gods seeming to want to punish the crew, the men become hopeless and desperate. With out good will of the gods, their journey seems to be impossible, and the men become “worn out and sick at heart.” Homer uses the words “tasting our grief” to show how unattainable the journey seems and how the men’s grief seems to emanate around the ship.

            The eerie tone of death presented to Odysseus and his crew how truly difficult his journey was. During Odysseus’s journey at sea, his crew and himself are faced with many challenges.

                        We saw death in that fury dropped the yards,

Unshipped the oars and pulled for the nearest lee:

Then two long days and nights we lay offshore

Worn out and sick at heart, tasting our grief. (Homer, 864)

After sailing for nine days with dangerous high winds and strong seas, Odysseus and his crew approached the island of the Lotus Eaters. At first arrival Odysseus and his crew thought that the Lotus Eaters were harmless, but Odysseus and his crew were deceived. The cunning and devious Lotus Eaters offer Odysseus’s men the alluring Lotus plant. Once the crew accepted this intriguing gift, Odysseus discovered that it was a deadly addictive plant. The interaction with the Lotus Eaters displayed the use of expression through words such as, death. The act of dying, death, was what Odysseus and his crew encountered as they were confronted with the terrible storm in the way to the Lotus Eater’s island.

            In “The Lotus Eaters” Homer uses words to describe how difficult the journey back to Ithaca was by showing Odysseus’s fear, hopelessness and the deaths of his men. Hopelessness, shown through Homer’s usage of tone, shows how truly difficult the trip back home is for Odysseus and his men. The author also uses tone to describe fear, which displays difficulties in their voyage.  Death is presented as well by the author’s use of words to affect the reader and shows the problems the crew face while traveling home. Often times, words are used to affect someone and show how difficult a journey is for someone.