Product Description

Hector bidding farewell to his wife and baby son, Odysseus bound to the mast listening to the Sirens, Penelope at the loom, Achilles dragging Hector's body round the walls of Troy - scenes from Homer have been reportrayed in every generation. The questions about mortality and identity that Homer's heroes ask, the bonds of love, respect and fellowship that motivate them, have gripped audiences for three millennia. Chapman's Iliad and Odyssey are great English epic poems, but they are also two of the liveliest and readable translations of Homer. Chapman's freshness makes the everyday world of nature and the craftsman as vivid as the battlefield and Mount Olympus. His poetry is driven by the excitement of the Renaissance discovery of classical civilisation as at once vital and distant, and is enriched by the perspectives of humanist thought.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #8725 in Books
• Published on: 2000-08-01
• Original language: Greek
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 976 pages

Customer Reviews

Timeless adventure with a touch of moral learning
The Odyssey is a truly inspirational story about never giving up. A father leaves his young family to fight for his country. He is snared by the gods when his fellow seamen fail a test of wills, and is forced to remain on an island with a stunning, eternally youthful and voluptuous goddess. In the decades he is gone, fighting in Troy, and anything else that happened across their ships path, the young men of his home town Congregate ceaselessly around his lonely wife, vying pitilessly for her affections. Eating him out of house and home in the meantime. His son tires of this selfish draining of his wealth, and ventures off in search of his long lost father. At the same time, Odysseus is finally released from his bondage to this goddess, and sets off to return home to his wife (Aaah). Your imagination is the only limit with the stylish descriptives of his adventures and battles. And of course, there's a happy ending. A worthy read and a perfect introduction to classic writing if reading the T E Lawrence translation.