The Importance of Table Manners: Feasting in the Odyssey and Spirited Away
There are scenes of feasting abound throughout both Spirited Away and the Odyssey where the essential nature of food is demonstrated, both as a form of sustenance and an essential aspect of social bonding and basic human connection. Feasts in the Odyssey are used as a sign of goodwill and acceptance, and mimics other social structures such as xenia. They are highly ritualistic, following a precise series of actions. This is seen at the feast in Menelaus’ palace, where Homer details even the metal of the basin they use to wash their hands. They are essential for social bonding. At both the feast at Menelaus’ and with the Phaeacians, only after sharing a meal together do they begin to discuss business. They reinforce social roles, Odysseus is quick to present the divine minstrel Demodocus with a portion of pork ‘with rich fat on either side’ as a sign of respect. The sustaining nature of food is demonstrated in an early scene in Spirited Away. When she first enters the spirit realm, Chihiro begins to literally disappear, until Haku gives her food that anchors her into the spirit world. This act also brings to mind the kore myth; Persephone is forced to stay in the underworld after tasting some pomegranate seeds. When Haku gives Chihiro an onigiri, a homey food mothers often pack in their children’s bento, he says ‘I put a spell on it so it’ll give you back your strength.’ Whilst eating them she begins to cry, as they remind her of her home, and afterwards she is more determined to save her family. Finally, when Lin shares dumplings with Chihiro, she shares at the same time also her dream of someday leaving the bathhouse. Therefore food is shown to not only be essential for nourishment, but also as a form of social interaction.
While feasts can function as a metaphor for the essential nature of human connection, these scenes are contrasted with acts of transgressive feasting, which appear just as often in both works. Cannibalistic characters like the Cyclops who ‘filled his great belly with this meal of human flesh’ and No Face, a patron of the bathhouse who begins to eat even the workers, act as a warning that when one member of society is overcome by greed, others will suffer. Just as the suitors at Odysseus’ palace are blind to the cost of their revels for Penelope and Telemachus, overindulging in food destroys the equal nature of a feast, and can be understood as a metaphor for acting selfishly, without care for others. As No Face consumes more food, its body becomes warped and grotesque, causing mayhem and destruction in the bathhouse.
This idea of transgressive feasting and overconsumption is brought together in a specific scene found in both Odyssey and Spirited Away. In the beginning of the film, Chihiro’s parents are turned into pigs, a scene that brings to mind the transformation of Odysseus’ comrades in Book 10. In both, transforming into pigs is the result of eating enchanted food. Warner states ‘imagining transformations has provided a lively enduring framework on which to hang definitions of what it means to be human and, hence, what it means to lose human status’. It begs the question: is it the body that makes us human? The significance of these scenes depends on common perceptions of pigs. In contemporary culture they are strongly associated with capitalism, greed, and excess. These characteristics are sharply contrasted in the scene where Chihiro visits them at the pigpens, as she calls out for her parents, one flicks a lazy ear and goes back to sleep. When Chihiro worries that they are ill, Haku remarks ‘they ate too much, they’re sleeping it off.’ Studio Ghibli themselves created this scene as criticism of Japan’s bubble economy in the 1980s, to highlight the greed and excessiveness that characterised the era, a theme also touched upon by Chihiro’s father who remarks as they enter the amusement park ‘they built them everywhere in the early nineties, then the economy went bad and they all went bankrupt.’ Of course, human-animal transformation is far from a unique plot device, and in fact found in many different cultures, from the Chinese nine-tailed fox to Loki of Norse mythology, but the similarity of the scenes and the choice of animal that deserves further analysis. Human-pig transformations appear as a recurring motif in everything from the Bible to Alice in Wonderland, connected to the Odyssey in a long cultural tradition of similar transformations. Pigs in particular seem to hold a fascination; and emphasised often is their association with insatiable hunger, signifying a return to animal nature. As Skulsky suggests, this scene in the Odyssey highlights Odysseus’ superiority by not falling to base desires and forgetting who he is, his intelligence allows him to avoid the punishment. Similarly, Chihiro expresses trepidation at her parents' actions, and tries to warn them saying ‘we’re gonna get in trouble, let’s just get out of here.’
In both Spirited Away and the Odyssey, feasting functions as a microcosm of larger social constructs. While it is an essential aspect of human connection, there is also the possibility of learning the wrong behaviour, as shown by the Cyclops and No Face. The transformation into pigs is therefore the pinnacle of transgressive feasting. For Odysseus and Chihiro, the formation of an identity is linked to a that of a larger social network, and it is important that they learn the proper way to behave in order to be able to reintegrate into and be useful to society.
Select Bibliography:
Miyazaki, H. (2001) Spirited Away. DVD. Studio Ghibli.
Homer. (tr. Rieu, E. V.) (1993) The Odyssey London: Penguin.
Bridge, D. (2014) ‘The Greatest Epic of the Twenty-first century?’ in Elliot, A. (ed.) The Return of the Epic Film: Genre, Aesthetics, and History in the 21st Century. Edinburgh: University Press, 188–200.
Hall, E. (2008) The Return of Ulysses. London: Bloomsbury.
Grey, M. (2006) ‘The disenchantment and re-enchantment of childhood in an age of globalization’ in International Journal of Children’s Spirituality 11.1, 11–2.
Skulsky, H. (1981) Metamorphosis: The Mind in Exile. Harvard: Harvard University Press.
Warner, M. (1998) No go the bogeyman: scaring, lulling, and making mock. London: Chatto & Windus.
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