A Commentary On Homer S Odyssey

This three volume commentary also includes an introduction discussing previous research on the Odyssey, its relation to the Iliad, the epic dialect, and the transmission of the text.

Finalist for the 2020 PROSE Awards, Classics section Homer’s Odyssey is the first great travel narrative in Western culture. A compelling tale about the consequences of war, and about redemption, transformation, and the search for home, the Odyssey continues to be studied in universities and schools, and to be read and referred to by ordinary readers. Reading Homer’s Odyssey offers a book-by-book commentary on the epic’s themes that informs the non-specialist and engages the seasoned reader in new perspectives. Among the themes discussed are hospitality, survival, wealth, reputation and immortality, the Olympian gods, self-reliance and community, civility, behavior, etiquette and technology, ease, inactivity and stagnation, Penelope’s relationship with Odysseus, Telemachus’ journey, Odysseus’ rejection of Calypso’s offer of immortality, Odysseus’ lies, Homer’s use of the House of Atreus and other myths, the cinematic qualities of the epic’s structure, women’s role in the epic, and the Odyssey’s true ending. Footnotes clarify and elaborate upon myths that Homer leaves unfinished, explain terms and phrases, and provide background information. The volume concludes with a general bibliography of work on the Odyssey, in addition to the bibliographies that accompany each book’s commentary. Published by Bucknell University Press. Distributed worldwide by Rutgers University Press.

Reproduction of the original: Homer’s Odyssey by Denton J. Snider

Since their composition almost 3,000 years ago the Homeric epics have lost none of their power to grip audiences and fire the imagination: with their stories of life and death, love and loss, war and peace they continue to speak to us at the deepest level about who we are across the span of generations. That being said, the world of Homer is in many ways distant from that in which we live today, with fundamental differences not only in language, social order, and religion, but in basic assumptions about the world and human nature. This volume offers a detailed yet accessible introduction to ancient Greek culture through the lens of Book One of the Odyssey, covering all of these aspects and more in a comprehensive Introduction designed to orient students in their studies of Greek literature and history. The full Greek text is included alongside a facing English translation which aims to reproduce as far as feasible the word order and sound play of the Greek original and is supplemented by a Glossary of Technical Terms and a full vocabulary keyed to the specific ways that words are used in Odyssey I. At the heart of the volume is a full-length line-by-line commentary, the first in English since the 1980s and updated to bring the latest scholarship to bear on the text: focusing on philological and linguistic issues, its close engagement with the original Greek yields insights that will be of use to scholars and advanced students as well as to those coming to the text for the first time.

Comprehensive commentaries on the Homeric texts abound, but this commentary concentrates on one major aspect of the Odyssey--its narrative art. The role of narrator and narratees, methods of characterization and scenery description, and the development of the plot are discussed. The study aims to enhance our understanding of this masterpiece of European literature. All Greek references are translated and technical terms are explained in a glossary. It is directed at students and scholars of Greek literature and comparative literature.

This three volume commentary also includes an introduction discussing previous research on the Odyssey, its relation to the Iliad, the epic dialect, and the transmission of the text.