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"Heaven has appointed us dwellers on earth a time for all things."
A fundamental piece of work in the modern Western canon, the Odyssey by Homer is considered one of the greatest epics of all times.
The book revolves around the Greek hero, Odysseus, king of Ithaca, and his ten-year journey to home after the fall of the city of Troy. Odysseus encounters divine and natural forces during his journey while his wife and son fend off suitors jostling for Ithaca's throne.
Nearly three thousand years after it was composed, the Odyssey remains one of the most celebrated and widely read stories ever told.
About the author
Homer is the name ascribed by the Ancient Greeks to the semi-legendary author of the two epic poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey, the central works of Greek literature. Many accounts of Homer's life circulated in classical antiquity, the most widespread being that he was a blind bard from Ionia, a region of central coastal Anatolia in present-day Turkey. The importance of Homer to the ancient Greeks is described in Plato's Republic, where he is referred to as the protos didaskalos, "first teacher", of tragedy, the hegemon paideias, "leader of learning" and the one who ten Hellada pepaideuken, "has taught Greece". Homer's works, which are about fifty percent speeches, provided models in persuasive speaking and writing that were emulated throughout the ancient and medieval Greek worlds. Fragments of Homer account for nearly half of all identifiable Greek literary papyrus finds in Egypt.
