Odyssey 2.208 · Book 2, lines 208–210
Telemachus stops pleading
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τὸν δʼ αὖ Τηλέμαχος πεπνυμένος ἀντίον ηὔδα·
Telemachus — Εὐρύμαχʼ ἠδὲ καὶ ἄλλοι, ὅσοι μνηστῆρες ἀγαυοί, ταῦτα μὲν οὐχ ὑμέας ἔτι λίσσομαι οὐδʼ ἀγορεύω·
Then, in turn, wise Telemachus answered him: “Eurymachus, and also you others, all you lordly suitors, about these things I no longer entreat you, nor make speeches:
Word by word
The setting
The reply-formula turns the floor from Eurymachus to Telemachus. He opens his answer to the assembled suitors — and his first move is to say he is done begging them.
A note on this passage
A standard reply-formula hands the speech to Telemachus, and he begins by refusing the posture he had held before: he will no longer entreat the suitors or make speeches at them about this.
It is a quiet growth. Earlier in the assembly Telemachus wept and pleaded; now he stops pleading. The fixed epithet πεπνυμένος, ‘wise, with the breath of understanding in him,’ sits over the moment he steps past supplication. The boy who could only ask is starting to speak as a man who has decided to act — and the poem marks the shift with its word for hard-won sense.
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