Homer and the OdysseyWho was Homer? This book takes us beyond the legends of the blind bard or the wandering poet to explore an author about whom nothing is known, except for his works. It offers a reading of the ancient biographies as clues to the reception of the Homeric poems in Antiquity and provides an introduction to the oral tradition which lay at the source of the Homeric epics. Above all, it takes us into the world of the Odyssey, a world that lies between history and fiction. It guides the reader through a poem which rivals the modern novel in its complexity, demonstrating the unity of the poem as a whole. It defines the many and varied figures of otherness by which the Greeks of the archaic period defined themselves and underlines the values promoted by the poem's depictions of men, women, and gods. Finally, it asks why, throughout the centuries from Homer to Kazantzakis and Joyce, the hero who never forgets his homeland and dreams constantly of return has never ceased to be the incarnation of what it is to be human. This translation is a revised and much expanded version of the original French text, and includes a new chapter on the representation of women in the Odyssey and an updated bibliography. |
Contents
Introduction | 1 |
1 From Homer to the Homeric Poems | 7 |
Between Tradition and Innovation | 46 |
3 Homer and History | 75 |
Narrations Narrators and Poets | 95 |
5 The Adventures of Telemachus | 132 |
6 Odysseus Travels | 150 |
7 Odysseus on Ithaca | 189 |
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Common terms and phrases
Achaeans Achilles adventures Adventures of Telemachus Aegisthus Agamemnon Alcinous Amphinomus Antinous appearance Arete arrival assembly Athena banquet bard beggar beginning of Book Book 19 Book 24 Calypso Circe Circe's companions contest contrast Cyclops death Demodocus described divine dream emphasizes end of Book epic episode epithet Eumaeus Eurycleia Eurymachus example expression father feast followed formula gifts give given goddess gods Greek guests hall heart Helen Hermes hero Homer Homeric poems honour husband Iliad intervention island Ithaca journey killed Laertes Laestrygonians land libation lines maidservants massacre Melanthius Menelaus Mycenaean narrative narrator Nausicaa Nestor occurs Odys Odysseus Odysseus in Book ŒÆd oral palace Penelope Penelope's Phaeacians Phemius Philoetius poet poetry Poseidon Pseudo-Plutarch Pylos reveal scene Scheria servants ship similes song Sparta speak speech story suitors takes Telemachus tells Theoclymenus tion tradition Trojan Trojan War Troy West wife words Zeus δὲ καὶ οἱ τε