Menelaus

Menelaus appears as a man of measured temperament and genuine courtesy, though capable of righteous anger when confronted with insolence or cowardice. He welcomes strangers with the warmth of one who has himself been a guest in foreign lands, offering them the finest hospitality and gifts. When young Telemachus arrives at his house seeking news of Odysseus (Ulysses), Menelaus receives him with honor and speaks candidly of his travels and sorrows. He grieves deeply for those lost in the Trojan War, especially for Odysseus (Ulysses), whom he remembers as a man of unparalleled endurance and cunning—the hero who held the Achaean warriors silent within the wooden horse despite Menelaus's own fierce desire to answer when Helen called out their names. His marriage to Helen remains, despite its troubled origins, a bond of deep feeling; he speaks of her with affection and admiration for her wisdom and beauty. A servant rebuked him once for his initial hesitation to welcome guests, a lapse from his usual character that he corrects swiftly, for he believes that all guests and travelers deserve care, having learned this truth through his own long wanderings. Though he will eventually be granted the Elysian Plain as his final rest by the gods, in his present time he remains a living monument to the war's aftermath, a man reconciled to loss but not unmindful of it.