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NICK’S VIEWS - It may be as old as time itself, yet it remains as fresh and instructive today as ever. It is more than a story of a man struggling through monsters, shipwrecks, and hostile landscapes to get home. It is a study of human character and moral trial—questions that still feel urgent in our world.
Odysseus, the architect of the Trojan Horse that gave Greece victory over Troy and the king of Ithaca, a small, rugged island dependent on his leadership, becomes a wanderer whose 10-year journey home tests his identity, morality, and command. He has come to represent the intelligent, adaptable leader who survives not by force, but through strategy, persuasion, psychological insight, and human.
For generations, leaders have studied him as an enduring model of resilience, moral struggle, and guidance through profound uncertainty.
Homer composed the story of Odysseus in the 8th or 7th century BCE, leaving an overwhelming legacy in literature and storytelling. His works shaped enduring models of power and humility, conflict and reconciliation, heroism, leadership, and human psychology, offering timeless insight into human behavior.
Odysseus is best understood not as a mythic superhero, but as a man scarred by war, which makes the just-released movie, The Odyssey, feel strikingly contemporary—a story of how prolonged conflict reshapes a leader’s mind. In my view, this is what Christopher Nolan brings to his adaptation of Homer’s ancient Greek epic.
Homer reflects Greek cultural values and its ethical world, including hospitality, excellence, intelligence, glory, and justice. At the same time, his work can be read as a handbook on power, legitimacy, persuasion, and leadership. He shows how to adjust to changing situations, real motives and betrayals, and know when to speak or remain silent—an enduring form of political wisdom.
It is important to note; the Greeks did not mythologize their leaders as flawless gods. Homer`s poetry became the "mirror" of Greek society-a lens focused sharply on what it means to lead, to fail, to succeed, and, crucially, to be human.
Homer speaks directly, even bluntly: when shared norms collapse, societies weaken and institutions soon follow. Society rests on the fragile foundation of trust and civic conduct.
He is credited with two surviving works which have become the foundational epics of Western literature: the Iliad and the Odyssey.
Winston Churchill, Abraham Lincoln, and other statesmen studied Homer’s heroic model of leadership and drew from it lessons that remain relevant today. Churchill’s wartime rhetoric, "Never Give Up", for example, reflects Homeric ideals of courage against overwhelming odds, how the leader becomes the embodiment of national resolve, and the belief that one individual can shape history.
It is the essence of leadership that Homer teaches rather than its techniques. Lincoln and Churchill turned to him for insight into the deeper structure of governance, not for a manual on political performance. They understood that public office is not merely administration, but an existential responsibility.
Lincoln’s belief in the Union’s destined mission, his appeal to "Divine Providence", echoes Homer’s idea that nations and peoples can be shaped by destiny. He reflected Homeric qualities indirectly, such as the moral burden of leadership, and a vision of national purpose.
Odysseus teaches that when a system collapses, you cannot fix it with speeches or negotiation alone — you must re‑establish legitimacy, enforce norms, and remove those who prey on the community.
During Odysseus’s long absence, Ithaca’s social order deteriorates. Opportunists rise, and society turns predatory rather than cooperative, as seen in the suitors pursuing Penelope. The episode offers a central lesson in leadership—how to restore a broken society.
First, he seeks to understand the system he must repair, diagnosing before acting. He distinguishes the loyal from the disloyal—those who upheld norms from those who exploited their collapse—an essential step in any recovery. Then he enforces justice. No society can function when destructive behavior goes unpunished or when institutions fail to uphold norms. Opportunists must not be allowed to take over.
Homer tells us that the suitors existed because of Odysseus’s absence, thus creating a power vacuum. And this vacuum attracted the opportunists, who destroyed norms, leading to society’s collapse. His return shows how hard it is to rebuild what was lost.
Odysseus defeats the suitors not by force alone, but through intelligence, alliances, targeted action, restored legitimacy, and restraint against retaliation—the core principles of modern counterinsurgency. Similar methods guide modern militaries when confronting destructive factions within a society.
Last year, in a column in this space, (Should Today`s Political Leaders Study Homer? September 8,2025) I wrote that today’s political readers must read Homer. I can still "hear" and feel the rhythms of Homer`s poems, when I studied them in ancient Greek, so many years ago. Homer still belongs at the table when leaders gather to make some of today’s hardest decisions.
Leadership today requires seeing the world as it is, not as we wish it were. As distrust in institutions and public fear grows, what is lacking is not intelligence or ambition, but perspective. The challenges we face are many: rising inequality, social division, eroding public trust, signs of autocracy, deportations, and more.
Homer shows that leadership can be wise, humane, and quietly heroic: choosing the harder, more generous path; recognizing the cost of failure; and working tirelessly to hold communities together, even when the odds seem overwhelming. At the same time, Homer reminds us that there is a price to be paid for vengeance.
I am always moved and inspired when I read Constantine P. Cavafy’s Ithaca., and I decided to include a version in my book. Odysseus’s Ithaca, his home, symbolizes the goals that give life direction, not destinations that guarantee fulfillment. The poem speaks to the full arc of human life and is often read at funerals and important milestones, including Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis’s funeral service.
In part, Cavafy said: “Have Ithaka always in your mind / Your arrival there is what you are destined for./ But don’t in the least hurry the journey. / Better it last for years, / so that when you reach the island you are old, / rich with all you have gained on the way, / not expecting Ithaca to give you wealth. / Ithaca gave you a splendid journey. / Without her you would not have set out. / She hasn’t anything else to give you.”
I remember what the philosopher Epictetus once said: "it is not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters." That is the spirit Homer models again and again. The task before us is as old as the walls of Troy, and every bit as urgent-"to hold fast to what is best in human nature, and to nurture it fiercely, one decision at a time".
(Nick Patsaouras is an electrical engineer, civic leader, and a longtime public advocate. He ran for Mayor in 1993 with a focus on rebuilding L.A. through transportation after the 1992 civil unrest. He has served on major public boards, including the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, Metro, and the Board of Zoning Appeals, helping guide infrastructure and planning policy in Los Angeles. He is the author of the book "The Making of Modern Los Angeles.")
