A fresh and original introduction to the Odyssey-and how it continues to shape literature, film, art and even the ways we make sense of our lives
Reading the Odyssey is an introduction to Homer's masterpiece like no other. It combines a cultural and intellectual history of the epic with an in-depth exploration of its unique and influential narrative structure and the ways it continues to inform issues of identity, meaning and experience.
Reading the Odyssey begins with a broad history of the epic's reception and interpretation, its place in cultural and intellectual history and its influence today on literature, film and art. After introducing the literary form of the Odyssey, the book turns to its main focus: the layered narrative that lies at the heart of the poem. Taking readers on a tour of the epic, Jonas Grethlein shows the nuanced ways the Odyssey uses a wide variety of narrative forms and functions. At the same time, he highlights how we all rely on narratives, first used by Homer, to form identities, forge communities and make sense of our lives.
The result is a compelling guide to the Odyssey that demonstrates why it continues to speak so powerfully to so many readers today. Jonas Grethlein is Chair in Greek literature at the University of Heidelberg. His books include Ancient Greek Texts and Modern Narrative Theory, The Ancient Aesthetics of Deception, Aesthetic Experiences and Classical Antiquity, and The Greeks and Their Past. "Divine Calypso, the sweetly singing Sirens, the one-eyed, man-eating giant Polyphemus-what's not to like about Homer's Odyssey? Distinguished Homerist Jonas Grethlein helps us share the eponymous hero's era- and genre-defining journey, full of spills as well as thrills, and one that we wish would never end."-Paul Cartledge, author of Thebes: The Forgotten City of Ancient Greece
"Reading the Odyssey is not merely a brilliant, up-to-date, engaging and accessible new introduction to Homer's alluring text by one of the leading experts in the field; it also doubles as a guide to the rich afterlife of the story of Odysseus's homecoming in art, literature and critical theory. Grethlein takes our reading of the Odyssey into the twenty-first century and makes even difficult aspects of the text and its reception a pleasure to think about."-Julia Kindt, author of The Trojan Horse and Other Stories
"This rich account of Homer's Odyssey deftly ranges across a vast terrain. Like its subject, it takes its reader on multiple luminous adventures-through scholarship, reception history and theoretical analyses."-Fiona Macintosh, University of Oxford
