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The Odyssey

The Odyssey. Mr. Eleftheriades English Language Arts. Introduction to The Odyssey. A man named Homer was credited with gathering numerous stories and forming them into two long works: The Iliad and The Odyssey.

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The Odyssey

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  1. The Odyssey Mr. Eleftheriades English Language Arts

  2. Introduction to The Odyssey • A man named Homer was credited with gathering numerous stories and forming them into two long works:The Iliad and The Odyssey. • The Iliad deals with a war between the great city of Troy and an alliance of Greek kings. • The Odyssey details the attempt of one Greek solider, Odysseus, to get home after the Trojan War.

  3. Background Information- The Iliad • The Iliad is set in the tenth and final year of the Trojan War. • The Greeks attacked Troy because a king’s wife (named Helen) ran off with a young prince of Troy. • The Greeks were eventually victorious.

  4. Background Information- The Odyssey • The Odyssey deals with Odysseus’s long journey home from the war. • In The Odyssey we first meet Odysseus 20 years after leaving Ithaca to fight in Troy and 10 years after having left Troy to return home. • The Odyssey is marked by melancholy and a feeling of post-war disillusionment. • Unlike many heroes of his time, readers can relate with a character like Odysseus.

  5. About the Author • No one is quite sure who Homer was. • Theories have circulated that Homer was a blind singer or that he was a legend. • Some believe that the work of Homer is actually the work of multiple authors. • Rhapsodes, or “singers of tales,” were singers who traveled from town to town telling stories of history, recent events, and of gods and goddesses.

  6. What is an Epic? • An epic is a long narrative poem that tells of the adventures of heroes who in some way embody the values of their civilization. • For centuries Greeks used The Odyssey in schools in order to teach values. • While there are many different types of epics, The Odyssey is a model for the epic of a long journey.

  7. How Were the Epics Told? • Most stories were sung by people who couldn’t read or write. • The singers followed a basic storyline, but improvised the minor details of the story from night to night. • The Odyssey is 11,300 lines long. It is assumed that many storytellers summarized parts of the works and went into greater detail during the more exciting scenes.

  8. Literary Terminology- Homeric simile • These similes compare heroic or epic events to simple and easily understandable everyday events that the audience would recognize… -Athena prevents an arrow from striking Menelaus “She brushed it away from his skin as lightly as when a mother brushes a fly away from her child who is lying in sweet sleep.”

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