Telemachus, son of Odysseus
It's now about twenty years since your father Odysseus left to go and fight at Troy. Since he's been away you've grown up (although you still think of yourself as a boy). Your mother Penelope, still a beautiful woman, is under increasing pressure to assume her husband is dead and remarry. A large number of young men ("the Suitors") from Ithaca and other islands want the wealth and status that they'd get from taking over your father's position. While they wait for Penelope to make her mind up, they are treating your house and property more and more like their own. If your father does come back, you wonder if there'll be anything left. You'd love be man enough to kick them all out, but you are just too timid.But today, there's a visitor, claiming to be an old family friend. He says he has important news …