The word nostalgia, which means “pain of return” in dictionaries, is a concept that has taken its place in the history of psychiatry as the name given to a psychological disorder experienced by people who have moved away or been removed from their homeland, as a result of missing their homeland and everything that belongs there. Nostalgia studies have been evaluated in many disciplines of social sciences as “nostalgia for the past” or “living in the past”. The subject of this study will be the comparison of the manifestation of the concept of nostalgia, which is derived from the Greek dictionary meaning of nostalgia, nostos “return” and algos “suffering” and used in the sense of “longing for homeland, homesickness” in Odyssey and Maaday Kara Epics. In the study, two epics will be evaluated in the context of homesickness. The nostalgic concerns of Odysseus, who left his homeland to fight, and Kögüdey Mergen, who had to leave his homeland as a child, will be evaluated. Both heroes are in the ideal hero type within the framework of social structures in their epics. However, apart from this ideal hero type, the individual characteristics of the heroes are also seen. However, apart from this ideal hero type, the individual characteristics of the heroes are also seen. Longing for their homeland, heroes fall into nostalgic hysteria after they somehow get away from their homeland. This nostalgic hysteria situation increases as the exile life gets longer. The concept of hero, which forms the basis of the social ideal, will be examined in the context of nostalgia, which was recognized as a psychiatric disorder diagnosed in the 17th century. In addition, as a cross-cultural comparison, the longing for the country in the epics of the two cultures and the struggles of the heroes as a result of this longing will be discussed.

Epic, nostalgia, homesickness, struggle, hero’s return.