The reference to the choice made by Odysseus, as italicized by us, gives the clue to the real meaning intended. Odysseus’ choice was last; each of the heroes preceding him in choosing their lot had neglected the lot of ‘the life of a private man who had no cares’, and Odysseus chooses this lot as the best of all.
If we consider the sort of life chosen by each of the Greeks who preceded Odysseus, we find it to be definitely symbolical of the character of the chooser:
Thus, Orpheus, the founder of the Orphic Mysteries, a divine teacher sent to instruct mankind by the god of song and music, Apollo, and held by the Greeks to have been the greatest of harp-players and the most enlightened of poets and singers, very appropriately chooses ‘the life of a swan’; for since immemorial time the swan has symbolized—as it still does—song and music; and Plato’s figurative language, correctly interpreted, implies that Orpheus was to reincarnate as a great poet and musician, as was but natural. To assume—as the exotericist may—that such a being as Orpheus could be born as a swan in reality thus appears to the esotericist to be untenable.
Likewise, Thamyras, an ancient Thracian bard, renowned as a harp-player and singer, symbolically chooses the life of the sweet-singing nightingale.
Ajax, the Homeric hero, who, next to Achilles, was the bravest of the Greeks, most fittingly chooses the life of a lion; for the king of beasts is, and has been for unknown ages, the symbol denoting bravery or fearlessness, which almost all nations and races of men have recognized.
Agamemnon, the next to choose, selects the life of an eagle; for among Greek heroes he was the chief, as Zeus was among the gods of Olympus; and, he having been regarded as an incarnation of Zeus and worshipped as one of the divinities, there is assigned to him the symbol of Zeus, which is the eagle.
Atalanta, the most swift-footed of mortals and famous for her foot-races with her many suitors, very naturally is reborn as a great athlete; and, in her case, Plato uses no symbol.
