The cave
Odysseus sends young Neoptolemus to find Philoctetes’ cave “twin mouthed, such that in chilly times a man might sit in the sun, or the summer breeze might funnel through to ease the heat with sleep”. The image of the cave shows what comforts a man can have on the deserted island, since such a place to sleep is the best comfortable place found on the island, and Philoctetes’ bed is “a bed of leaves”.
Loneliness
A poetically presented image of Philoctetes’s loneliness appeals to the reader’s sense of mercy and compassion.
“How, how can this unlucky man endure? O dark are the dealings of gods, unhappy the races of men whose fortunes were in excess! This man second to none it may beof the houses hallowed by time, has no share in life's joys, lies abandoned, apart from mankind, his company the wild and dappled beasts, piteous both in his cries and his famine, he gives tongue to the torment he feels, insupportable pains, with Echo, babbling, heard from afar, the only one to heed his bitter grief.”
Hatred
An image of Odysseus is traced in the works of many of the ancient writers, but in Sophocles’s tragedy Philoctetes Odysseus is revealed as a sly, cunning and even insidious person. On his advice the Greeks have left wounded Philoctetes on the island of Lemnos, where he was fated to suffer in complete solitude. Odysseus is an object of deep hatred for Philoctetes and the poor man says that Odysseus is “the kind of man who ought indeed to have perished”. Wishing another person death is the peak of hatred. This image of a cunning Odysseus makes him an antagonist of the play.
