The Returns of Odysseus

The Returns of Odysseus PDF Author: Irad Malkin
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520920262
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 350

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Book Description
This remarkably rich and multifaceted study of early Greek exploration makes an original contribution to current discussions of the encounters between Greeks and non-Greeks. Focusing in particular on myths about Odysseus and other heroes who visited foreign lands on their mythical voyages homeward after the Trojan War, Irad Malkin shows how these stories functioned to mediate encounters and conceptualize ethnicity and identity during the Archaic and Classical periods. Synthesizing a wide range of archaeological, mythological, and literary sources, this exceptionally learned book strengthens our understanding of early Greek exploration and city-founding along the coasts of the Western Mediterranean, reconceptualizes the role of myth in ancient societies, and revitalizes our understanding of ethnicity in antiquity. Malkin shows how the figure of Odysseus became a proto-colonial hero whose influence transcended the Greek-speaking world. The return-myths constituted a generative mythology, giving rise to oral poems, stories, iconographic imagery, rituals, historiographical interpretation, and the articulation of ethnic identities. Reassessing the role of Homer and alternative return-myths, the book argues for the active historical function of myth and collective representations and traces their changing roles through a spectrum of colonial perceptions—from the proto-colonial, through justifications of expansion and annexation, and up to decolonization.

The Returns of Odysseus

The Returns of Odysseus PDF Author: Irad Malkin
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520920262
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 350

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Book Description
This remarkably rich and multifaceted study of early Greek exploration makes an original contribution to current discussions of the encounters between Greeks and non-Greeks. Focusing in particular on myths about Odysseus and other heroes who visited foreign lands on their mythical voyages homeward after the Trojan War, Irad Malkin shows how these stories functioned to mediate encounters and conceptualize ethnicity and identity during the Archaic and Classical periods. Synthesizing a wide range of archaeological, mythological, and literary sources, this exceptionally learned book strengthens our understanding of early Greek exploration and city-founding along the coasts of the Western Mediterranean, reconceptualizes the role of myth in ancient societies, and revitalizes our understanding of ethnicity in antiquity. Malkin shows how the figure of Odysseus became a proto-colonial hero whose influence transcended the Greek-speaking world. The return-myths constituted a generative mythology, giving rise to oral poems, stories, iconographic imagery, rituals, historiographical interpretation, and the articulation of ethnic identities. Reassessing the role of Homer and alternative return-myths, the book argues for the active historical function of myth and collective representations and traces their changing roles through a spectrum of colonial perceptions—from the proto-colonial, through justifications of expansion and annexation, and up to decolonization.

The Return of Odysseus

The Return of Odysseus PDF Author: I. M. Richardson
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780816700165
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 36

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Book Description
Odysseus returns at last to Ithaca where he rids his house of the evil suitors, is reunited with Penelope, and visits his aging, grieving father.

The Unknown Odysseus

The Unknown Odysseus PDF Author: Thomas Van Nortwick
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
ISBN: 047202521X
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 162

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Book Description
The Unknown Odysseus is a study of how Homer creates two versions of his hero, one who is the triumphant protagonist of the revenge plot and another, more subversive, anonymous figure whose various personae exemplify an entirely different set of assumptions about the world through which each hero moves and about the shape and meaning of human life. Separating the two perspectives allows us to see more clearly how the poem's dual focus can begin to explain some of the notorious difficulties readers have encountered in thinking about the Odyssey. In The Unknown Odysseus, Thomas Van Nortwick offers the most complete exploration to date of the implications of Odysseus' divided nature, showing how it allows Homer to explore the riddles of human identity in a profound way that is not usually recognized by studies focusing on only one "real" hero in the narrative. This new perspective on the epic enriches the world of the poem in a way that will interest both general readers and classical scholars. ". . .an elegant and lucid critical study that is also a good introduction to the poem." ---David Quint, London Review of Books "Thomas Van Nortwick's eloquently written book will give the neophyte a clear interpretive path through the epic while reminding experienced readers why they should still care about the Odyssey's unresolved interpretive cruces. The Unknown Odysseus is not merely accessible, but a true pleasure to read." ---Lillian Doherty, University of Maryland "Contributing to an important new perspective on understanding the epic, Thomas Van Nortwick wishes to resist the dominant, even imperial narrative that tries so hard to trick, beguile, and even bully its listeners into accepting the inevitability of Odysseus' heroism." ---Victoria Pedrick, Georgetown University Thomas Van Nortwick is Nathan A. Greenberg Professor of Classics at Oberlin College and author of Somewhere I Have Never Travelled: The Second Self and the Hero's Journey in Ancient Epic (1992) and Oedipus: The Meaning of a Masculine Life (1998). Jacket art: Head of Odysseus from a sculptural group representing Odysseus killing Polyphemus in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale in Sperlonga, Italy. Photograph by Marie-Lan Nguyen.

Odysseus Returns Home

Odysseus Returns Home PDF Author: Homer
Publisher: Penguin Classics
ISBN: 9780141026299
Category : Epic poetry, Greek
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
After war and strife, a mighty king's troubles are only just beginning . . . After ten years at war and ten years wandering the world, Odysseus has finally returned home. But he cannot reveal his identity to his faithful wife Penelope. A gang of would-be lovers are pestering her to marry one of them - and are prepared to kill anyone who claims to be her husband. Now Odysseus must use all his cunning and ingenuity to get rid of them, if he is to reclaim his wife and his rightful place as King of Ithaca once and for all.

The Odyssey

The Odyssey PDF Author: William G. Thalmann
Publisher: Macmillan Reference USA
ISBN:
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 182

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Book Description
Homer's two great epic poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey, stand as cornerstones not only of Western literature but also of Western thought and culture, for although readers of two millennia have imitated or opposed these works' paradigm of character and action, few have ignored it. Where the Iliad strikes a heavy tone of tragic grandeur, the Odyssey evokes an atmosphere of adventure and fate. The latter work's key figure, Odysseus the restless wanderer, pervades our language and our thinking: his self-defining journey of experience and maturation has remained one of the world's most explored subjects of artistic expression. In his cogent reading of the Odyssey William G. Thalmann argues that, like its hero, the text is impossible to reduce to a single summary or set of oppositions. As presented in Homer's narrative, the polarities of nature versus civilization, war versus peace, action versus word, and force versus metis (intelligence) are fraught with ambiguity. Thalmann singles out in particular the precarious nature of metis, which imbues Odysseus with constructive intelligence but also a dangerous duplicity. Similarly, Thalmann contends that in all his travels Odysseus both inflicts pain and himself suffers after having saved his own life via his cleverness. Aside from its explorations of human character, however, the poem quite simply tells a wonderful story. Odysseus's myriad adventures during his 10-year struggle to get home to Ithaka have the powerful appeal of folktale and fairy tale: the poem's narrative, Thalmann asserts, offers the pleasure of desiring an end that is delayed by obstacles in the outer world and the necessity for intrigues on Ithaka, with the simultaneousassurance that the end will come, and that it will be a happy one. Thalmann perceptively identifies traces of class and gender inquiry in Homer's epic. The poem seems to open up questions about the upholding of a system by which those at the top of society are maintained by the labor of those below, Thalmann maintains; in due course, however, these questions are closed off with the ideal solution of the return of the righteous king, promising prosperity for all. Additionally, Thalmann detects in Penelope an independence and importance rarely accorded women in Greek literature or Greek life; her like-mindedness with Odysseus is emphasized and their marriage characterized as a collaboration between them. What makes Homer's text so relevant to our times, Thalmann concludes, is its suffusion with contradiction and elusiveness. Odysseus, after all, is a hero with a constantly deferred future, and the poem's ending preserves the tension between his two conflicting sides, for when peace is at hand our hero, overcome with battle fury, assaults the relatives of his enemies. Ultimately, Thalmann finds that, happy ending notwithstanding, Homer's masterpiece depicts man's complex and often insidious relationship with the world - a world wherein that which passes for truth seems like fantasy, and lies contain no monsters or miracles but are indistinguishable from the reality of experience.

The Return of Odysseus

The Return of Odysseus PDF Author: I. M. Richardson
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780816700158
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 36

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Book Description
Odysseus returns at last to Ithaca where he rids his house of the evil suitors, is reunited with Penelope, and visits his aging, grieving father.

The Return of Ulysses

The Return of Ulysses PDF Author: Edith Hall
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 0857718304
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 306

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Book Description
Whether they focus on the bewitching song of the Sirens, his cunning escape from the cave of the terrifying one-eyed Cyclops, or the vengeful slaying of the suitors of his beautiful wife Penelope, the stirring adventures of Ulysses/Odysseus are amongst the most durable in human culture. The picaresque return of the wandering pirate-king is one of the most popular texts of all time, crossing East-West divides and inspiring poets and film-makers worldwide. But why, over three thousand years, has the Odyssey's appeal proved so remarkably resilient and long-lasting? In her much-praised book Edith Hall explains the enduring fascination of Homer's epic in terms of its extraordinary susceptibility to adaptation. Not only has the story reflected a myriad of different agendas, but - from the tragedies of classical Athens to modern detective fiction, film, travelogue and opera - it has seemed perhaps uniquely fertile in generating new artistic forms. Cultural texts as diverse as Joyce's Ulysses, Suzanne Vega's Calypso, Monteverdi's Il Ritorno d'Ulisse in Patria, the Coen Brothers' O Brother Where Art Thou?, Daniel Vigne's Le Retour de Martin Guerre and Anthony Minghella's Cold Mountain all show that Odysseus is truly a versatile hero. His travels across the wine-dark Aegean are journeys not just into the mind of one of the most brilliantly creative of all the ancient Greek writers. They are as much a voyage beyond the boundaries of a narrative which can plausibly lay claim to being the quintessential global phenomenon.

The Return of Odysseus

The Return of Odysseus PDF Author: Homer
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 72

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Book Description


Return to Ithaca

Return to Ithaca PDF Author: Glyn Iliffe
Publisher: Canelo
ISBN: 1911591789
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 596

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Book Description
The epic story of Odysseus’s journey home, the historical fantasy series finale by an author who has been called “a demi-god of the genre” (The Catholic Herald). Odysseus has been to Hell and back. Deserted by the Gods, and now in bitter conflict with his friend Eperitus, times look bleak. He dreams of returning to his home; to Ithaca. But back on Ithaca things look little better. His son Telemachus and wife Penelope are besieged by a gang of suitors, believing Odysseus to be dead and looking for her hand in marriage. Odysseus and Eperitus have survived everything. But now they face a last test, perhaps the most difficult of all . . . Can they reclaim what has been lost? For readers of David Gemmell, Christian Cameron and Simon Scarrow, Return to Ithaca is the stunning conclusion to the Adventures of Odysseus series.

Odyssey

Odyssey PDF Author: Homer
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 9780198788805
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
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.