I first read the Odyssey roughly ten years ago, almost entirely on trains and buses. I like to think that was a rather clever approach given the subject matter. I can't remember now why I decided to read it along with the Iliad (I started with the Iliad because I somehow got the idea that that was Volume 1 and the Odyssey the sequel). I had been made to read some excerpts at school, but wasn't very impressed so no memories. I must also confess that being Hungarian, I read those excerpts in Hungarian translation, and was further alienated by the impeccably (or so I was led to believe) reproduced rhythm of the original poem. The rhythm of the Hungarian translation is so powerful that I had a classmate whose father used to recite passages from the Odyssey to get her to sleep when she was a baby. And now that I'm doing this course I'm going to read it again, this time in English. I have my Hungarian copy at hand, so it will be interesting to compare the two as well as to consult the original courtesy of Perseus Digital Library (link on the right in "Resources") and thanks to the little Ancient Greek I managed to pick up doing A275 last year. I would like to emphasize, however, that I have relied heavily on the dictionaries included on Perseus, and all my knowledge comes from them! I have made some effort to transliterate Greek words accurately and consistently but can't promise 100% reliability. If you spot a mistake, please let me know. (I didn't try to transliterate proper names though.) As the course hasn't started yet, I have no idea in which order we will be required to read the set books, but my money is on the Odyssey and anyway there will be no set rules here. I thought I should perhaps produce one entry per chapter (or Book, as it is called in the English translation), but then again, I am whimsical and also lazy, so may change my mind about everything along the way. Everybody's welcome to leave comments and I hope you will! One more thing. I haven't read Lattimore's introduction because, in my experience, introductions tend to be full of spoilers. Also, I don't want to be influenced by his opinions before I have seen and judged the thing for myself. You might wish to act in the same spirit with regards to my blog entries. I will clearly indicate in the titles which part of the book I am discussing. A note to the editors of the book. I would like to politely point out that Richmond Lattimore is not the "author" of the Odyssey, as is stated on pp. 1-8 of the Appendix. But the cover is great!
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AuthorHave studied A219 Exploring the Classical World and A275 Reading Classical Greek at the Open University. Currently studying for a Psychology degree. ImagesPlease click on any image to be taken to its source.
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