About this episode

The episode reviews Homer's The Odyssey, discussing its readability, themes, and characters compared to The Iliad.

In this Mere Mortals book review, I talk through The Odyssey by Homer the famous follow-up companion to The Iliad, and one of the great adventure stories of the Western canon. Compared with The Iliad, I found The Odyssey much more readable, more story-driven, and honestly more enjoyable. This is the great soldier-returning-home story: Odysseus trying to make his way back to Ithaca after the Trojan War, while Telemachus searches for answers, Penelope holds off the suitors, and the gods keep interfering with everyone’s lives. 0:00 Intro — The Odyssey after The Iliad 0:54 The basic structure of The Odyssey 1:18 Odysseus, Ulysses and the journey home 2:03 Telemachus, Penelope and the suitors 2:43 Where Odysseus has been 3:09 Cyclops, monsters and the famous adventures 3:46 Returning to Ithaca 4:04 The original soldier-coming-home story 4:25 Why The Odyssey reads better than The Iliad 5:02 The book that kept me reading at night 6:00 Why this story has lasted 7:10 Iliad vs Odyssey: rage vs cunning 8:19 Major themes: home, temptation, storytelling and justice 10:03 The parts I skimmed 10:43 Should you read The Iliad first? 11:37 Final thoughts on The Odyssey 12:26 Final recommendation…

People in this episode

Hosts: Kyrin Down, Juan Granados

Topics covered

• Homer
• The Odyssey
• The Iliad
• adventure stories
• Greek mythology
• literary analysis
• themes of home

Keywords

• Homer
• The Odyssey
• The Iliad
• Odysseus
• Greek mythology
• literary themes
• adventure
• storytelling
• Trojan War

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: The Odyssey, The Iliad

Places: Ithaca, Trojan War

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