[schlow22]

Although Homer’s epic poems were likely written down sometime between 750 and 650 B.C.E., they are set in a much earlier time period. The Odyssey is set in Mycenaean Greece in the twelfth century B.C.E., during an age when the Greeks believed that gods interacted directly with mortals. It is unknown whether Homer’s Trojan War represents a real historical event and, in general, Homer’s epics are approached as written embodiments of Greek folklore. The long, narrative poems are composed in an elevated style, and the central characters are often godlike heroes. [links]

[jef.blanc]

Little is known about the life of Homer, and some scholars believe that the two epic poems attributed to him may have also had other authors. Regardless of whether or not this is true, it is generally believed that the poems were heavily influenced by the Greeks’ long tradition of oral poetry, which had for many centuries passed along grand stories of gods and heroes.

[draglin33]

The Iliad and its sequel, the Odyssey, were composed in Greece in the late eighth and early seventh centuries B.C.E., and are generally attributed to a blind poet named Homer. The Iliad details the Trojan War, in which a Greek army attacked the city of Troy in order to rescue the beautiful Helen, who had been kidnapped by the Trojans. The Odyssey describes the arduous ten-year journey home of one of these Greek heroes, Odysseus.

[JohnnieMc]

Odysseus, the hero of the Odyssey, is a mortal man with remarkable physical and mental gifts. Although Odysseus possesses many godlike qualities, he struggles with the mortal pitfalls of temptation and has to overcome great adversity in order to return home. The Odyssey revolves around timeless themes of family, relationships, personal growth, vengeance and justice, which is why the epic poem continues to be an object of study and interest to the contemporary reader.

[adamjkok]

here

[Luther]

Until the 15th century all volumes of the Odyssey in circulation were in handwritten Greek. In 1488 the first printed version (still in Greek) was produced in Florence. The earliest vernacular translations of the Odyssey from its original Ionic Greek dialect began to appear in Europe during the 16th century. Applying the ancient Greek metre to contemporary vernaculars, especially to words meant to be spoken aloud rather than read privately, posed a particular challenge, forcing translators to add and invent words in order to make the metre work. Some have translated it into prose and some into verse.

[brynfrlin]

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[s20-10s]

The first translation into English based on Homer’s original Greek was by playwright and poet George Chapman, published in London in 1616. Other notable early translators include Alexander Pope (1725–26), William Morris (1887), and Samuel Butler (1900). Several English translations were published in the 20th century, notably those by Emile Victor (E.V.) Rieu (1945; revised and reissued by his son, D.C.H. Rieu, in 1991), Robert Fitzgerald (1961), and Richmond Lattimore (1965). A best-selling verse translation by Robert Fagles (1996) was praised for employing language both contemporary and timeless. In 2017 Emily Wilson became, according to her publisher, the first woman to translate and publish the Odyssey in English. The poem has also been adapted for children and young readers and has been issued by Marvel as a comic book. The Odyssey, and the telling of a journey home, has inspired many works of art and fiction such as James Joyce’s Ulysses (1922); Margaret Atwood’s The Penelopiad (2005), the tale told through the eyes of Penelope; and the Coen brothers film O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000).

[bosco]

Scholars date the writing of the Odyssey to about 675–725 bce . The poem was intended for oral performance. It was composed of 12,109 lines written in dactylic hexameter (sometimes referred to as “Homeric hexameter”)—that is, each line consisted of six feet, or metrical units, and each foot consisted of a dactyl (a stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables). The original work may not have been constructed into the 24 books known to the contemporary reader, and the parts were certainly not in codex form. In the ancient world, the poem was likely written in columns on rolls made from papyrus, or possibly some kind of animal skin (such as vellum and parchment). Given its extraordinary length, the poem may have actually occupied 24 individual rolls. Homer’s role in the writing of the poem and whether he was literate have been a source for rich scholarly debate, commonly referred to as the “Homeric Question.”

[chmod755]

While there is no conclusive evidence supporting the historicity of the Odyssey’s story and its characters, it has been proposed that geographic elements of Homer’s poem were real and have persisted into the present. In particular, scholars and ancient-history enthusiasts have suggested a possible location for the Ithaca of the poem, and it’s not the Greek island now named Ithaca. here

[milkiway]

The majority of the Odyssey takes place on and around the Aegean Sea before concluding in Odysseus’s kingdom of Ithaca.

[knightmb]

3.) Circe-Odysseus sends his men to find out what she is, turns men into pigs, Hermes gives Odysseus garlic so he doesn't turn into pig

[markharry114]

3.) Circe-Odysseus sends his men to find out what she is, turns men into pigs, Hermes gives Odysseus garlic so he doesn't turn into pig

[robotmonkey]

10 most important events in the odyssey
1.) the lotus eaters-drugged Odysseus' men. here

[daltonmiddleto]

Much of the action in the Odyssey takes place on the sea, where Odysseus must battle against the storms of the sea god, Poseidon, but the last third of the story is set in the town and countryside of Ithaka. The setting is a geographical potpourri of what was important, mythologically, in Homer's time period.

[Sultan]

One may also ask, where has Odysseus been and why? The hero is long-suffering Odysseus, king of Ithaca and surrounding islands and hero of the Trojan War. He has been gone 20 years from his homeland, his wife, Penelope, and his son, Telemachus.

[thrashaholic]

here