Odyssey of Life
I just watched The Odyssey movie by Christopher Nolan. Yes, I know I am a bit late here, even for a China release. I loved the cinematography, it is absolutely gorgeous. Apparently it was filmed in a few countries, such as Morocco, Italy, Greece, Scotland, Iceland and Malta. I have not read Homer’s book of the same, but the storytelling in the movie is really good. Looking back at the director’s past work, I was surprised to learned that Memento was also one of his works. Loved that movie, but I think my favourite from him is still Inception, the ending is so good.
A bit about The Odyssey
As with any good movie, you end up digging into the reviews, stories, and such. And I looked into understanding the original works a bit more. Apparently, it is one of the oldest surviving works of literature, created around 8th to 7th century BCE and it is actually a very long poem: 12,000 lines and split into 24 books, During that time, because most people were illiterate, it is either sung or recited out with music, instead of it being read as a book, as we assume it would be today. This reminds of how Book of Odes 诗经 and Song Poetry 宋词 were meant to be sung or chanted with music as well. Book of Odes was also created around similar timeframe as The Odyssey. Different places, but eventually humans come down with similar conclusions to things (re singing).
Hero’s Journey
Anyways, the movie made me think about the hero’s journey, which is quite a typical arc for these type of stories, but the thing that kept me thinking a bit more is how it relates to our own lives. We are born into this world, which is not of our own choice. And a lot of the major decisions during adolescence is shaped by our parents, relatives, community, and the environment. And like a switch of a button when we graduate from school, we are thrown into the adult world of job, money, relationships, sex, family, children, responsibility, and so much more.
Similar to Odyssey, we need to survive in this complex changing world, especially with trends in AI and robotics that are changing so fast. As we land into different places (and sometimes totally different worlds) we need to adapt. Also if we do “get lost in the sea”, how do we get back home? Or at least get back into the right direction of life? When we are young, we have ambitious ideals of what we want to do when we grow up, and then after 20 or 30 years “in the wild”, do we still have that wide-eyed enthusiasm? And do we continue to hold those ideals that we had when we were younger? Thinking about my own journey, I think I survived. Mostly due to luck, and probably just naivety. I feel like I still have a lot of curiosity for the world, and thanks to my daughter, I get to relive my childhood again, with her and my wife.
How do we even start to learn to navigate this world? Like Odyssey’s son, who basically grew up without his father, he needs to figure out what to do, basically “learning on the job”. Even till this day, it seems a lot of these big topics in life, such as health, money, relationships, and happiness are not really taught anywhere directly. Most of these are observed, felt, and absorbed from every day life, especially in the family. And I hope I am doing an okay job as a father, and continue to do so.
Other things that stood out
FIXME: Other things to write….
- Zeus’ Law -> Xenia
- Omens, Superstition and Rituals
