Idealized marble bust of Homer (Roman copy of a Greek original), British Museum. Wikimedia Commons.
Poet · Pairings I & X
Homer
c. 8th century BCE · Ancient Greece
“Tell me, O Muse, of that ingenious hero who travelled far and wide.”
“Homer” is the name traditionally given to the poet of the two great epics that stand at the very foundation of Western literature: the Iliad and the Odyssey. Almost nothing about him is known for certain. He may have been a single genius, a name later attached to a long tradition of oral bards, or several poets whose work fused over time. By legend he was blind.
The epics took shape in an oral tradition — composed and performed aloud, with the help of repeated phrases and formulas, around the 8th century BCE — and were written down later. The Odyssey tells of the cunning hero Odysseus and his ten-year struggle to return home after the Trojan War, an adventure that includes his famous encounter with the Sirens featured in this module.
For nearly three thousand years, Homer’s stories, characters, and images have been retold, translated, and reimagined by countless writers — including, in this curriculum, Dorothy Parker and Margaret Atwood.
In this curriculum
Pairing I — The Woman Who Waited → Pairing X — Giving Voice to the Monster →