The Odyssey

Front Cover
A&C Black, Jul 17, 2014 - Poetry - 352 pages

'Muse, tell me of a man: a man of much resource, who was made to wander far and long, after he had sacked the sacred city of Troy. Many were the men whose lands he saw and came to know their thinking: many too the miseries at sea which he suffered in his heart, as he sought to win his own life and the safe return of his companions.'

Recounting the epic journey home of Odysseus from the Trojan War, The Odyssey - alongside its sister poem The Iliad - stands as the well-spring of Western Civilisation and culture, an inspiration to poets, writers and thinkers for thousands of years since. This authoritative prose translation by Martin Hammond brings Homer's great poem of homecoming to life as Odysseus battles through such familiar dangers as the cave of the Cyclops, the call of the Sirens and his hostile reception back in his native land of Ithaca.

 

Contents

BOOK 1 The Gods Athene and Telemachos
1
BOOK 2 Telemachos and the Suitors
11
BOOK 3 Telemachos in Pylos
21
BOOK 4 Telemachos in Sparta
33
BOOK 5 Odysseus and Kalypso
51
BOOK 6 Nausikaä
61
BOOK 7 Odysseus in Phaiacia
69
BOOK 8 Phaiacian Games and Song
77
BOOK 14 Odysseus and Eumaios
147
BOOK 15 Telemachos Returns
159
BOOK 16 Odysseus and Telemachos
171
BOOK 17 Odysseus Comes to his House
181
BOOK 18 Odysseus as Beggar
195
BOOK 19 Eurykleia Recognises Odysseus
205
BOOK 20 Insults and Omens
219
BOOK 21 The Trial of the Bow
229

BOOK 9 The Cyclops
89
BOOK 10 Kirke
101
BOOK 11 The Underworld
113
BOOK 12 Skylla and Charybdis
127
BOOK 13 Return to Ithaka
137
BOOK 22 The Suitors Killed
239
BOOK 23 Odysseus and Penelope
251
BOOK 24 The Underworld Laertes Peace
259
Index
271
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About the author (2014)

Homer is known only as the author of the The Iliad and The Odyssey, the two epic poems of the Trojan War and its aftermath that mark the birth of Western culture. Nothing is known of his life.

Martin Hammond was Head of Classics at Eton College, UK and subsequently Master in College. Since 1990 he has been Headmaster of Tonbridge School, UK. He is the translator of the Penguin Classics edition of Homer's The Iliad.

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