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Overview
The Odyssey is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is, in part, a sequel to the Iliad, the other work ascribed to Homer. The Odyssey is fundamental to the modern Western canon, and is the second-oldest extant work of Western literature; the Iliad is the oldest. Scholars believe the Odyssey was composed near the end of the 8th century BC, somewhere in Ionia, the Greek coastal region of Anatolia.
The poem mainly focuses on the Greek hero Odysseus (known as Ulysses in Roman myths), king of Ithaca, and his journey home after the fall of Troy. It takes Odysseus ten years to reach Ithaca after the ten-year Trojan War. In his absence, it is assumed Odysseus has died, and his wife Penelope and son Telemachus must deal with a group of unruly suitors, the Mnesteres (Greek: Μνηστῆρες) or Proci, who compete for Penelope's hand in marriage.
Product Details
ISBN-13: | 9789176372944 |
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Publisher: | Wisehouse Classics |
Publication date: | 09/15/2017 |
Pages: | 432 |
Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.96(d) |
Lexile: | 830L (what's this?) |
About the Author
Both the Iliad and the Odyssey are attributed to Homer, the first and greatest of the Greek poets. Homer's biographical dates are a matter of conjecture, as is his actual existence. Legend characterizes him as a blind minstrel who wandered Greece, singing his epic poems in the ancient oral tradition.
American artist and illustrator Newell Convers Wyeth (1882–1945) was a student of Howard Pyle. He created more than 3,000 paintings and illustrated more than 100 books. His home and studio in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, are designated as a National Historic Landmark.
American poet William Cullen Bryant (1794–1878) was also a lawyer, journalist, and long-time editor of the New-York Evening Post. He studied both Greek and Latin in his youth, and in his old age he revisited his love of the classics to write blank-verse translations of both the Iliad and the Odyssey.
Read an Excerpt
IAthene Visits Telemachus
Tell me, Muse, the story of that resourceful man who was driven to wander far and wide after he had sacked the holy citadel of Troy. He saw the cities of many people and he learnt their ways. He suffered great anguish on the high seas in his struggles to preserve his life and bring his comrades home. But he failed to save those comrades, in spite of all his efforts. It was their own transgression that brought them to their doom, for in their folly they devoured the oxen of Hyperion the Sun-god and he saw to it that they would never return. Tell us this story, goddess daughter of Zeus, beginning at whatever point you will.
All the survivors of the war had reached their homes by now and so put the perils of battle and the sea behind them. Odysseus alone was prevented from returning to the home and wife he yearned for by that powerful goddess, the Nymph Calypso, who longed for him to marry her, and kept him in her vaulted cave. Not even when the rolling seasons brought in the year which the gods had chosen for his homecoming to Ithaca was he clear of his troubles and safe among his friends. Yet all the gods pitied him, except Poseidon, who pursued the heroic Odysseus with relentless malice till the day when he reached his own country.
Poseidon, however, was now gone on a visit to the distant Ethiopians, in the most remote part of the world, half of whom live where the Sun goes down, and half where he rises. He had gone to accept a sacrifice of bulls and rams, and there he sat and enjoyed the pleasures of the feast. Meanwhile the rest of the gods had assembled in the palace of Olympian Zeus, and the Father of men and gods opened a discussion among them. He had been thinking of the handsome Aegisthus, whom Agamemnon’s far-famed son Orestes killed; and it was with Aegisthus in his mind that Zeus now addressed the immortals:
‘What a lamentable thing it is that men should blame the gods and regard us as the source of their troubles, when it is their own transgressions which bring them suffering that was not their destiny. Consider Aegisthus: it was not his destiny to steal Agamemnon’s wife and murder her husband when he came home. He knew the result would be utter disaster, since we ourselves had sent Hermes, the keen-eyed Giant-slayer, to warn him neither to kill the man nor to court his wife. For Orestes, as Hermes told him, was bound to avenge Agamemnon as soon as he grew up and thought with longing of his home. Yet with all his friendly counsel Hermes failed to dissuade him. And now Aegisthus has paid the final price for all his sins.’
Table of Contents
Translator's Preface | ix | |
Introduction | xix | |
1 | Trouble at Home | 3 |
2 | A Gathering and a Parting | 16 |
3 | In the Great Hall of Nestor | 28 |
4 | With Menelaos and Helen | 43 |
5 | A Raft on the High Seas | 67 |
6 | Laundry Friends | 81 |
7 | The Warmest Welcome | 91 |
8 | Songs, Challenges, Dances, and Gifts | 101 |
9 | A Battle, the Lotos, and a Savage's Cave | 118 |
10 | Mad Winds, Laistrugonians, and an Enchantress | 135 |
11 | The Land of the Dead | 152 |
12 | Evil Song, a Deadly Strait, and Forbidden Herds | 171 |
13 | A Strange Arrival Home | 184 |
14 | The House of the Swineherd | 197 |
15 | Son and Father Converging | 213 |
16 | Father and Son Reunited | 229 |
17 | Unknown in His Own House | 243 |
18 | Fights in the Great Hall | 261 |
19 | Memory and Dream in the Palace | 274 |
20 | Dawn of the Death-Day | 292 |
21 | The Stringing of the Bow | 304 |
22 | Revenge in the Great Hall | 317 |
23 | Husband and Wife at Last | 332 |
24 | Last Tensions and Peace | 343 |
Notes | 359 | |
Names in the Odyssey | 409 | |
Bibliography | 417 |
What People are Saying About This
This is a fine, fast-moving version of the liveliest epic of classical antiquity. With a bracing economy, accuracy, and poetic control, Edward McCrorie conveys the freshness and challenge of the original in clear, sensitive, and direct language. Instead of the uncertain solemnity of some previous translations or the free re-creation of others, McCrorie has managed a version that will have immediate appeal to this generation of students and general readers alike.
Edward McCrorie's translation of the Odyssey answers the demands of movement and accuracy in a rendition of the poem. His verse line is brisk and efficient, often captures the rhythm and the sound of the Greek, and functions well as an English equivalent of the Greek hexameter. Unlike most translators, he wishes to preserve at least some of the sound of the Greek, and his rendition of the formula glaukôpis Athene as glow-eyed Athene is inspired. He remains true to the formulae of Homeric verse, and several of his choicessuch as rose-fingered daylight or words had a feathery swiftnessdelight. Homer, Zeus-like, would have nodded his approval.