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The Odyssey
The Odyssey
The Odyssey
Audiobook (abridged)9 hours

The Odyssey

Written by Homer

Narrated by Derek Jacobi

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

4/5

()

About this audiobook

The most popular epic of Western culture springs to life in Allen Mandelbaum's magnificent translation.Homer's masterpiece tells the story of Odysseus, the ideal Greek hero, as he travels home to Ithaca after the Trojan War-a journey of ten years and countless thrilling adventures. Rich in Greek folklore and myth, featuring gods and goddesses, monsters and sorceresses, The Odyssey has enchanted listeners around the world for thousands of years. Mandelbaum's robust, romantic, lyrical translation has an openness and immediacy unsurpassed by any other. Read aloud, it is a wonderful way to experience this enduring classic.
LanguageEnglish
TranslatorAllen Mandelbaum
Release dateJun 16, 2000
ISBN9781598874402
Author

Homer

Although recognized as one of the greatest ancient Greek poets, the life and figure of Homer remains shrouded in mystery. Credited with the authorship of the epic poems Iliad and Odyssey, Homer, if he existed, is believed to have lived during the ninth century BC, and has been identified variously as a Babylonian, an Ithacan, or an Ionian. Regardless of his citizenship, Homer’s poems and speeches played a key role in shaping Greek culture, and Homeric studies remains one of the oldest continuous areas of scholarship, reaching from antiquity through to modern times.

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Reviews for The Odyssey

Rating: 4.238095238095238 out of 5 stars
4/5

168 ratings142 reviews

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  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    This book is a timeless epic (and an actual epic, not in the way the word is overused anymore). The language of Homer is down to earth and not flowery or difficult to read or understand. The characters are relatable to some degree; one quickly realizes the superstitions of today are deeply rooted in ancient cultures.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Great story, but such a terrible translation.

    God, Heaven, Hell, and I think even the Devil make an appearance. I kept expecting Jesus to show up walking across the water to convey Odysseus home. Plus it's written as if this tale takes place in the British Isles rather than the Mediterranean.

    I'm not going to force myself to slog through another dated mistranslation. Life is too short for that.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    The greatest of all ancient Greek works is spellbinding. Fagles' prose is lean and muscular, giving a grit and immediacy to his adventures. Loved it when I read it in high school, love it still today. As relevant today as it was nealy 3000 years ago.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Once I got past the "dated" prose it was very interesting. Though it was read through English1H, it wasn't hard to get through; it went generally fast. Besides having to memorize all 958 characters for tests and quizzes, it was a good read. It's hard to believe this 300 page novel was read by memory at parties to the tune of a harp.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Experienced an unplanned event while traveling? Or feel like you are living through an epic of misfortune that will not end? Or just having a really bad day? If you answered yes to any of these questions then rush to your shelves and re-read a chapter of Odysseus’ travails on his way home. [Pause for you to finish reading chapter]. OK, deep breath, now your problems don’t seem so bad, do they? Recommended for all adventurers who need more perspective.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I won't say too much about the actual story. Everyone already knows that stuff from freshman English and general knowledge of myths and literary tropes. It has monsters and heroes and true love and coming of age and an awesome scene with a trick arrow shot and 3 guys against the world. Give it a try if you haven't looked at it since you were 15.

    I'm not sure I had ever read the whole Odyssey before. In any case, I now have heard the whole thing performed by Ian McKellen. I suppose Homer on audio book is about as close as I'll get to the original, unless someone can point me to someone who does the audio book in ancient Greek... McKellen's narration was great, but I bought the book to listen to while driving, and it put me to sleep. The story was really quite exciting, even if it did drag on a little when Odysseus was planning his suitor revenge. I guess we skipped that part in 9th grade English. But Gandalf's voice seemed to be more suited for bedtime stories than distracting me from traffic jams. I know what I'll be listening to when I can't get to sleep though.

    The translation, by Robert Fagles, was excellent. There were some places where I was like "that seems really colloquial" but then I was glad because it really was easy to understand. I would use this translation if I ever needed to read Homer for some reason.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Okay, I finally forced myself to read it after all these years, and I found it boring,lengthy, slow reading, who cares! The gods are mad at Odysseus, so they put him through hell getting home. He's forced to sleep with a bevy of minor goddesses while his wife is plagued by slimy suitors at home. His son goes in search of him, but after slogging through nearly 200 pages, I gave up. Skip the book and watch "O, brother, Where art Thou?" Far more entertaining!
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I'm not sure, but I think this was the edition I read & liked the best - I've read several over the years. I liked the 'full' or 'best translated' versions & the highly edited versions the least. There's a happy medium in there. The full versions have a lot characters & stuff going on that doesn't add to the story & just confuses me. When edited too much, the story loses its flavor. The story line, plot, can't be beat. Much of the motivation of the characters seems weak or over-used, but that's only because it is the great-granddaddy of so much of our current literature, of course.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Infinitely more enjoyable than the Iliad, but slightly different than I remember. I really don't remember the story being so disjointed. Don't get me wrong, I really love the Odyssey, but I would have preferred if it had been more linear (instead of so much of it being told in retrospect).I didn't quite get to that point I often expereince with epic works where I feel as though I've lost a friend, though I will miss the great adventure! I wish more time had been devoted to Odysseus's actual voyage, but I'll take what I can get from such an ancient work.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    The tribulations of the wily Odysseus making his way home after the Trojan war to his wife Penelope in Ithaca. An excellent translation for today's reader with a masterly introduction by the classicist Bernard Knox. "So they traded stories, the two ghosts standing there in the House of Death..." As Ted Hughes wrote, "Just the right blend of sophistication and roughness it seems to me."
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    You must read a Robert Fagles' translation. Fagles makes the story come alive. Enjoy!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Still a classic translation although there are several more recent.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Having trouble getting through the more academic poetic translations? I totally recommend the modern prose tranlsation by Eickhoff. Reads more like a novel than an esoteric, long-ago epic. Not that he can erase Homer's overarching misogynism, but that's a story for another day ;).
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This is a harrowing epic tale. While I enjoyed reading it, I think it may have been more effective if I heard it told, much like it would have been when Homer was alive. Regardless, adventure fans should enjoy this.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This particular edition translated by Robert Fagles is by far the best translation that I have come across. This edition really makes it easy to enjoy the epic tale while other translations sometimes lets the reader muddle through the language barriers. I have read this for undergraduate level as well as reading this for pleasure this wins my 4 stars in both categories.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Though most people seem to prefer The Iliad to The Odyssey, I like the latter for its sheer fabulous inventiveness. The story is fairly simple, Odysseus is trying to make his way home to the Greek island of Ithaca after the Trojan war, but he's earned the ire of the god Poseidon so it's not going to be an easy task. Meanwhile, his wife Penelope is beset with a veritable infestation of suitors and she's running out of delaying tactics.The poem divides itself between Odysseus's ordeals (exciting!) and the troubles back at home with his wife and son (not quite so exciting). Some of my favorite parts:- the encounter with a certain cranky monoptic giant with a taste for human flesh- the trip to the underworld and Odysseus's conversations with the recently deceased. (Apparently being dead kind of sucks.)- the Scylla and Charybdis incident, in which a crevice-lurking multi-headed monstrosity and a nasty whirlpool double-team our hero and his ship. What's not to like?- The sirens, Circe and her isle of enchanted pigs, and so on.. All good stuff.PS: I had one small irritation while reading this. Robert Fagles deploys the phrase "dawn with her rose-red fingers" one too many times in this book. He used it quite a bit in The Iliad as well, but The Iliad has a different flow and therefore it doesn't seem quite as conspicuously repetitive. I know it's part of Homer's poetic style, but a bit more variation from the translator would have been appreciated.One last thought: I felt very, very sorry for Odysseus's dog.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Starts out well enough but once Odysseus gets home everything went downhill and became a real bore.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Rather unusual Swedish translation of Homer's Odyssey. It was on display in the window of an antiquarian bookseller, and as I was going to the annual meeting of the Swedish-Finnish James Joyce Society, it was … destiny.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I read this book as an assignment in school so ... it's was not necessary my like or my choice, but I think it was a goodread ( :) ), isn't it a classic after all? I get confused between the Illiad and the Odyssey - that's how concentrated I was but I have always thought and made a mental note to read it later in my life. It is later in my life now ... mmm
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This was not at all what I expected. I had steeled myself to reading a long flowering epic poem that would be repetitive and impossible to understand. Instead, I found this to be surprisingly readable and even more surprisingly interesting. A few things really helped me on my journey. I was reading and listening to this book using the Fagles translation which is narrated by Ian McKellen - excellent! I also listened in parallel to Elizabeth Vandiver's lectures about The Odyssey. There are only 12 lectures, but she adds so much background to the story that it added the depth and perspective I needed to make this a very enjoyable read.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Robert Fagles once again preserves the timeless nature of the human spirit in Homer's The Odyssey. Odysseus portray the the endurance of the human spirit against all odds. Although Odysseus is favored by the gods for his wit and courage, he is damned by Poseidon to roam the seas for 10 years before reaching his beloved home of Ithaca. During these ten years Odysseus encounters many entertaining conflicts and characters. The Odyssey accounts for the greek heroes famous journey and struggle to finally have peace at his home.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    As with my review of Lombardo's translation of the Iliad, I will not comment on homers masterful and classic story. Many others have done so and I can add little.

    But, like his translation of the Iliad, Lombardo's modern and dramatic style make this classic engaging.

    Highly recommended.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I had attempted to read The Odyssey once before and failed miserably. Since then I've learned just how important the translator is when choosing to read ancient classics. I'm happy that I found a different translation to try which made this a much more enjoyable and engaging read. Given that the story comes from a time of oral tradition I decided to try out the audio book, which I think was the right idea but the wrong narrator for me. More on that below.For anyone who doesn't know, The Odyssey was written by Homer somewhere around 800 BC. The epic poem relates the story of Odysseus and his trials on his return journey home after the Trojan war. For such a simple premise, the scope is vast. It has a little bit of everything (magic, monsters, gods, suitors, shipwrecks, action) and touches on so many themes (violence and the aftermath of war, poverty, wealth, marriage and family, betrayal, yearning for ones home, hospitality) that is is easy to see why this poem is so important and how it has inspired many stories to this day. One of the best and worst parts about this version was the introduction to the poem. The intro goes into great detail about the controversies about the poem's origins and dives deeply into the poem's many themes. This was great for someone who already knows the story and wants to learn more before getting into Odysseus's tale. For those that don't like spoilers, it's best if you skip the introduction and read/listen to it after you're done with the poem. Fair warning for audio book listeners - the introduction is roughly 3.5 hours long and I was definitely getting impatient to hear the poem long before it was done.I listened to the audio book narrated by Claire Danes. This has really driven home that I need to listen to a sample of the narrator before choosing my audio books. Claire does an adequate job when reading the descriptive paragraphs but just didn't work for me when it came to dialog. All her characters, male and female, sounded the same and were a bit over done so it was a challenge to keep who was speaking apart. She is going on my avoid list for future audio books.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Boring. I'd suggest giving O Brother Where Art Thou a chance instead. But thats just me. They poor our a few to many libations I thought. It gets a little boring.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    A soldier returns home ten years later than expected.2.5/4 (Okay).There are some really good parts near the end. Most of the book is tedious.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    My knowledge of classical literature and mythology is sadly lacking. The main reason I decided to tackle The Odyssey is because I want to read Ulysses and I gather that a passing acquaintance with this work will make that experience more meaningful.Listening to Ian McKellen reading the Robert Fagles' translation made me regret my lack of education in the classics. I have no way of assessing the merits of Fagles' work, but I would love be to be able to read this epic poem in the language in which it was written and not feel that I was missing most of its cultural, social and political context.Given my lack of familiarity with Greek mythology, it was interesting to realise just how much of the story is imbedded in my consciousness, from Penelope unravelling her weaving to put off her suitors, to the story of the Sirens, to the Cyclops. This is but a small indicstion of the importance of this epic to Western history and literature.Overall, I found The Odyssey more interesting for what it represents as a primary source of Western literature than for the characters or the plot. Odysseus is not exactly a hero for modern times: he may be a master tactician and warrior, but he's also a consummate liar, a rapist, a plunderer and a murderer. The other characters don't have a lot going for them either, at least not in contemporary terms. However, in spite of having an instinctive reaction against the Odysseus' behaviour and the horrific violence contained in the text, I still found it compulsive listening. I loved the non-linear structure and the rhythm of the language. In addition. I was fascinated by the involvement of the gods in the affairs of human beings: directing their actions, subverting their plans, punishing them and performing the odd makeover to assist them to achieve their ends.Ian McKellen's narration was - unsurprisingly - excellent. However, the sound quality of the audiobook left a bit to be desired. At times it was blurry and the volume was variable. While I would have benefited from the introduction and endnotes in a good text edition of this work, listening to an epic poem almost certainly written to be read aloud was for me the best way of tackling it. At some point I'd like to read a well annotated edition in order to learn what my ignorance led me to miss.How can I not give five stars to a literary work which is still being read and discussed thousands of years after it was written?
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This epic I never did try to read as a teenager, but I knew that it too would come someday just as the Iliad would. This epic took longer to read than the Iliad, but then the translation of the Iliad I read had some books taken out for the sake of the readers. This translation by Fagles didn't cut anything out. I really enjoyed this translation. I've heard others praise Fagles as a wonderful translator and I have to agree. This myth is also an outstanding one. It really personifies the Quest Pattern we now-a-days link to many books. This is another epic I would love to listen to as well, so we'll see if I can get my hands on another good translation.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Condensed version of the incredible epic, though Odysseus does not loose his luster even in Spanish. He continues to be a hero you wish to see home, but know he has many flaws that he needs to work on.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    How much I enjoy this book: I just re-read it for the third time, this time in preparation for Joyce's Ulysses and Burroughs's Naked Lunch (Arnold Weinstein from Brown University says Burroughs was heavily influenced by the Odyssey).

    There are several reasons the Odyssey is still good after almost three thousand years--among many, the structure pulls you in, the plot keeps you interested, Ulysses, Telemachus, and Penelope go through interesting and realistic changes. It's a wonderfully well-told story.

  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    It is difficult to read and review a book like this. To read because I can’t help but view it with my 21st century sensibilities in place and to review because I’m sure that I missed elements of importance because I don’t have a classical background. But since a lot of people will approach this book in exactly this way, I’ll try to organize my thoughts.Let me get this out of the way – yes I was trying to fit each episode into O Brother, Where Art Thou? the whole time. Most don’t fit. Like…who exactly where the Hogwallops? And the ladies in the stream…were they Sirens or the girls who helped Odysseus when he washed up in the river on Ithaca? And just what was Baby-face Nelson supposed to represent? Ha! So I guess the Coens took a few liberties with their bong hits.Oh and another thing I’ll get out of the way – ancient Greek men are insufferable. I’m aghast at how little they thought of women. The table in my dining room has more say over its destiny than a woman did in ancient Greece. They treat their dogs better. Penelope’s fate was so maddening because she had no say in it. The assholes eating her out of house and home had a perfect right to do so apparently, and neither she nor Telemachus could do a thing about it. And here I thought ancient Roman women got the short end of the stick…at least they got to eat in the same room as the men. Bah! Weak-minded humanity. Renders ½ its population as inert property while it slaughters the other. Men are weird.Ok. That’s over now. I’m still mad about it, but what can I do? So the story itself went in a way I didn’t expect. Telemachus gets going first and we see him granted warm welcomes in the houses of both Nestor and Menelaus. The thing that really struck me here was how naive the ancient Greeks seemed to be. They accept strangers on the face of things and don’t even ask their names before giving gifts, new clothes, baths, money and ships with men and provisions to further their journeys. Weird. No wonder they found Odysseus highly tricky for a simple ploy like the horse at Troy. These days subterfuge is just an accepted part of any conflict and just daily life half the time. Anyway, we get some of Odysseus’s story from Nestor and Menelaus and not directly from Odysseus as I thought we would.And the parts of the story I thought would be big deals and go on forever were treated with just a few lines and then – zip – they were done. The Sirens are a perfect example. That episode gets a lot of press and artwork devoted to it and it hardly lasts a minute with nothing of import happening at all. Again, not what I expected. There is, however, a lot of repetition of baths and anointing with olive oil and the rosy-fingered presence of dawn. Boy Homer ground that metaphor to death. The broad back of the sea or the fish-giving sea was another. But I guess it became more of a refrain for the bards who told this story again and again.The wind-up took forever with lots of extraneous detail and elaborate lies to cover up Odysseus’s true identity. The whole time Odysseus was disguised as a beggar I was grinding my teeth with wanting to get to the ass-kicking. I mean, I don’t care what made up crap you tell everyone, just get on with it. Eventually, we get it, but like everything else he does, Odysseus takes his time. For a man who wanted to get home really fast, he spent a lot of time farting around…like spending all that time with Circe. Oh sure he really wanted to see Ithaca again. And it’s the same with the ass-kicking, he strings it out as long as possible. Finally everyone is dead and we think he and Penelope will just rush into each other’s arms and fade to black. Not so. More lamentations, disbelief and foot-dragging.Anyway, it’s an interesting story and an enlightening one. I learned a lot about how the Greeks viewed their world and how helpless they really felt. So much shit just rolled downhill. Injustice heaped on injustice with a full complement of excuses. Cranky, childish and mercurial gods at the top, women and slaves on the bottom.