Abstract
In Homer’s great epic poem, The Odyssey, the Greek hero Odysseus makes a ten-year journey home to Ithaca after the Trojan War, beset by innumerable threats and misadventures. In Book Twelve, we find Odysseus being warned by the goddess Circe of a significant danger on the next stage of his sea voyage. His ship, he learns, must sail past the island of the Sirens: those creatures who spellbind any man alive, whoever comes their way. Whoever draws too close, off guard, and catches the Sirens’ voices in the air — no sailing home for him, no wife rising to meet him, no happy children beaming up at their father’s face. The high, thrilling song of the Sirens will transfix him, Lolling there in their meadow, round them heaps of corpses rotting away.… (Homer 1997: 200)
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© 2013 Anthony E. Bottoms
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Bottoms, A.E. (2013). Learning from Odysseus: Self-Applied Situational Crime Prevention as an Aid to Compliance. In: Ugwudike, P., Raynor, P. (eds) What Works in Offender Compliance. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137019523_5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137019523_5
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