Odyssey (books 13-end) - Homer

"I knew I should have taken that left turn at Albuquerque." - Bugs Bunny, channeling the spirit of Homer.

We've all had our horror stories struggling to get home after a long days' work, but has it ever taken you 10 years?

Whereas The Epic of Gilgamesh was forgotten, its clay tablets buried beneath the earth, for over two thousand years, the Odyssey has been a popular story since Homer first told it,(if he ever did,) and remains in the DNA of classic and popular literature, film, art and every other form of media today. But do you really know the story?

Odysseus, king of Ithaca, wanders for 10 years trying to get home after the Trojan War. He is distracted in his journey by vengeful gods, terrifying monsters and powerful women. While he struggles to return home, his wife Penelope has to deal with with the unwelcome advances of 108 suitors (a bit like Tinder), while Odysseus's son Telemachus entreats the help of bright-eyed Athena to reunite his parents and save his family and his home.

Odysseus has survived the horrors of Scylla and Charybdis, two separate islands featuring man-eating giants, and the advances of Circe and Calypso who so obnoxiously insist on having sex with him. But now he has to face his greatest challenge yet... his wife Penelope. And her 108 would-be boyfriends hanging out in the garden. Some men just never know to take a hint! It's been ten years.

Will Odysseus reunite lovingly with his family? Or will the gods withdraw their favour and allow him to become a pincushion to the suitors' spears and arrows? They do have a habit of being a bit contrary, those gods. We'll be discussing the book as a whole, so no worries if you missed the first meeting, and Jack will also be making one too many references to James Joyce's Ulysses, so consider yourself warned.

Any translation you can find is perfectly fine - I'll be comparing the Robert Fagles Penguin Classics translation with the contemporary Emily Wilson translation. Any other translation, in poetry or prose, is welcome. If you need soft copies of one of the above translations, please feel free to email me at jack.malone67@gmail.com

As my Meetup membership only allows me to create events with up to 10 people, please mark your status as 'Not Going' if you're not able to make it so that I have a good idea of what numbers to book the table for. If you're on the waitlist, please send me a message if you're interested in coming! The more the merrier. We usually discuss the book together for about an hour and then move on to more general discussion for as long as we'd like.