🚢🚢🚢 THE ODYSSEY by Homer 🚢🚢🚢

 

The Odyssey by Homer
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

ALWAYS GO BACK TO THE CLASSICS.

This has been a marvellous listen narrated by the iconic Claire Danes. What a treat!

What amazes me the most about it is the fact that it is a "SIMPLE" plot told in such an EPIC way that it has become FOUNDATIONAL in every aspect.

Storywise, it is Odysseus's journey back to his homeland and the many tribulations he encounters along the way. On the island of Ithaca, Penelope is waiting ever so PATIENTLY for 20 years for his beloved husband to come back home. Telemachus, their beloved son, consoling his mother and venturing in a quest to bring his father back. In between, the suitors trying to marry Penelope and siege the land and take profit from every side possible.

Literaturewise, the fact that it is supposedly a spoken tale that has been collected over the years and Homer is believed to have put it all together in such a unique way - it being in the form of verse none the less - is remarkable.

Culturally, it has become iconic in such a way that modern literature is often based on this story to make up new stories. The themes, symbols, props, characters, gods and goddesses, the sea, the ships, and so on and so forth.

You can read an adapted or abridged version as a child or the fully unabridged version as an adult and you will still find it inspiring, authentic, fascinating and very much REAL.

If you haven't read it because you feel it is boring, old or any other preconceived notion please reconsider. You will not be disappointed. You may like it more or less but I find it very difficult that you do not like it.

If you have read it, it is always refreshing to go back to it no matter when you do so. It has grounded me in more ways than I thought of.

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