I The Supreme - pg. 131

An exhalation, a breath of its own. Those who know most, see most, are always blind. Those with the sweetest voices, the mute. Those with the keenest hearing, the deaf. Homer! O mere repeater of other blind men and deafmutes! Man's principal malady is his insatiable curiosity regarding things he cannot know.

I The Supreme - pg. 65

Books have a destiny, though destiny has no book. Without the people from which they had been cut off by sign and story even the prophets would not have been able to write the Bible. The Greek people called Homer composed the Iliad. The Egyptians and the Chinese dictated their histories to scribes who dreamed of being the people, not copyists who sneezed the way you do on what you've written. A Homer-people creates a novel.

Agape Agape - pg. 23

Talks about the detachable self that can be withdrawn from the body, some kind of religious community Pythagoras set up with the ideas of lives to come, and these dangerous demons with lives and energies of their own according to Homer was it?

The Odyssey - Notes

This is the secret object of contest between epic and mythos: the self does not make adventure out of obstinate opposition, rather it comes to create is own obstinacy by means of this opposition, a stark unity in a world of multiplicity which negates that unity. Odysseus, like the heroes of all real novels after him, gives himself away in order that he may come to win himself; the distancing form nature which he effects is realized in the abandonment to nature in which every episode he eschews; and, ironically, the relentless force which he commands triumphs-- he comes home a relentless hero, as judge and avenger of the heritage of the forces he escaped.

The Odyssey - Closing

Then bright-eyed Athene spoke out to Odysseus:

"Zeus-born son of Laertes, Odyssey of many wiles,

Hold off and cease from the strife of impartial war,

Lest Zeus, the broad-seeing son of Cronos, in some way get angry."

So Athene said. He obeyed, and rejoiced in his heart.

Then Pallas Athene, daughter of aegis-bearing Zeus,

Established oaths for the future between both sides,

Likening herself to Mentor in form and in voice.

The Odyssey - pg. 238

Odyssey of many wiles glared at them and spoke:

"Dogs, you thought I would no longer come home in return

From the land of the Trojans; and so you wore my house awar

And slept alongside my serving women by force

And underhandedly courted my wife while I was myself alive,

And you did not fear the gods who possess broad heaven,

Or that there would be any vengeance of men in time to come.

Now the bonds of destruction are fastened on you all."

So he said, and sallow fear got a grip on all of them.

The Odyssey - pg. 221

The troubles of his heart, his wife, who had a sense of devotion,

Woke up and wept while sitting up in her soft bed.

And when she was sated in her own heart with weeping,

The divine women prayed to Artemis first of all:

"Artemis, queenly goddess, daughter of Zeus, would that now

You might strike my chest with an arrow and take my life away

At this very time, or that a storm would now snatch me up

And depart carrying me forth upon the murky ways,

And throw me in the streams of backward-flowing Oceanos;

The Odyssey - pg. 172

Then Zeus-born Odysseus answered him with a speech:

"Eumaeos, you have stirred the heart very much in my breast

As you tell the details of the pain you suffered in your heart.

But Zeus has provided good for along with evil

When, having suffered much, you reached the home of a man

Who was mild, and who furnished you with food and drink

Kindly. And you live a good life. But as for me,

I reach here after wandering to many cities of men."

The Odyssey - pg. 158

But I think is not in order, nor will you convince me

When you speak about Odysseus. Why does a man like you need

To lie fruitlessly? Well do I myself also know

Of my master's return, that he has been very much hated

By all the gods, as they did not subdue him among the Trojans

Or in the arms of his friends, after he had wound up the war.

Then all the Achaians would have made him a funeral mound,

And he would have won great glory for his son, too, hereafter.

As it is, the storm winds have snatched him off without glory.

But I myself live apart among the swine. Nor do I

Go to the city unless prudent Penelope happens

To urge me to come when a message comes from somewhere,

But then the men sit there and ask for the details,

Both those who grieve for the master who is gone so long

And those who enjoy devouring a livelihood scot free.

The Odyssey - pg. 126

The sort of disgraceful deed which that woman plotted,

Devising murder for her wedded husband. I thought

Indeed that I would come home welcome to my children

And my servants. But she, with utter evil on her mind,

Poured shame upon herself and upon womenkind to come

Hereafter, even on one who might do good deeds.'

So he said, and then I addressed him in answer:

'Alas, broad-seeing Zeus has terribly hated

The descent of Atreus from the outset because of the plans

Of women. Many men perished because of Helen;

Clytemenstra made a plot against you while you were far away,

So I said, and he at once addressed me in answer:

'So never be mild yourself, henceforth, even to your wife.

Reveal to her no entire story that you know well,

But tell a part of it and the rest be concealed.

The Odyssey - pg. 66

They gave a long shout. And godly Odysseus woke up.

He sat there and deliberated in his mind and heart:
"Ah me, to what land of mortals have I come this time?

Are these men proud and savage and without justice,

Or are they friendly to stranders and have a fod-fearing mind?

How the sound of girls' voices has sussounded me,

Of nymphs, who hold the lofty peaks of mountains,

And the sources of rivers and the grassy meadows!

Or am I somewhere near men who are of clear speech?

Well, come, I shall make a trial myself and see."

The Odyssey - pg. 62

But when as he swam on he came up to the mouth

Of a fair-flowing river, there the best place seemed to him to be.

It was bare of rocks, and it had a shelter from the wind.

He perceived it flowing and prayed to it in his heart.

"Hear me Lord,, whoever you are; I approach you with many

Prayers, fleeing the rebukes of Poseidon out of the ocean.

A man should be respected even by the immortal gods

When anyone approaches, wandering, as now I,

Who have suffered much, approach your knees and your flowing.

Have pity, Lord. I declare I am a suppliant to you."

So he said. At once the river stopped flowing and held the wave.

It made a calm in front of him and rescued him

At the issue of the river. The he bent both his knees

And his stout hands. For his own heart was drowned by salt water.

The Odyssey - Opening

I

Tell me, Muse, about the man of many turns, who many

Way wandered when he had sacked Troy's holy citadel;

On the ocean he suffered many pain within his heart,

Striving for his life and his companion's return.

But he did not save his companions, though he wanted to:

They lost their own loves because of their recklessness.

The fools, they devoured the cattle of Hyperion,

The Sun, and he took away the day of their return.

Begin the tale somewhere for us also, goddess, daughter of Zeus.

A NORTON CRITICAL EDITION
Homer

THE ODYSSEY

A VERSE TRANSLATION
BACKGROUNDS
CRITICISM

SECOND EDITION

Translated and Edited by

ALBERT COOK

BROWN UNIVERSITY

W .W. NORTON & COMPANY . New York . London

Copyright 1993, 1974, 1967 by Albert Cook

All rights reserved

The text of this book is composed in Electra, with display in Bernhard. Composition and manufacturing by the Maple-Vail Book Group.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Homer.

W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 500 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10110

www.wwnorton.com

W. W. Norton & Company Ltd., Castle House, 75/76 Wells Street, London W1T 3QT

Iliad - pg. 18

And Zeus, the master of cloud and storm:

"You witch! Your intuitions are always right.

But what does it get you? Nothing, except that

I like you less than ever. And so you're be worse off.

If it's as you think it is, it's my business not yours.

So sit down and shut up and do as I say.

You see these hands? All the gods on Olympus

Won't be able to help you if I ever lay them on you."

Iliad - pg. 12

Heard his beloved priest's prayer.

He hit the Greeks hard, and the troops

Were falling over dead, the god's arrows

Raining down all through the Greek camp.

A prophet told us the Arch-Destroyer's will,

And I demanded the fos be appeased.

Agamemnon for angry, stood up

And threatened me, and made good his threat.

Iliad - pg. 11

"Mother, since you bore me for a short life only,

Olympian Zeus was supposed to grant me honr.

Well, he hasn't given me any at all. Agamemnon

Has taken away my prize and dishonored me."

Iliad - pg. 6

Who will honor me, not least of all Zeus the Counsellor.

To me, you're the most hateful king under heaven,

A born troublemaker. You actually like fighting and war.

If you're all that strong, it's just a gift from some god.

Iliad - pg. 3

"Achilles, beloved of Zeus, you want me to tell you

About the rage of Lord Apollo, the Arch-Destroyer.

And I will tell you. But you have to promise me and swear

You will support me and protect me in word and deed.

I have a feeling I might offend a person of some authority

Among the Greeks, and you know how it is when a king

Is angry with an underling. He might swallow his temper

For a day, but he hold it in his heart until later

And it all comes out. Will you guarantee my security?"

Iliad - Opening

ILIAD 1

RAGE:

Sing, Goddess, Achilles' rage,

Black and murderous, that cost the Greeks

Incalculable pain, pitched countless souls

Of heroes into Hades' dark,

And left their bodies to rot as feasts

For dogs and birds, as Zeus' will was done.

Begin with the clash between Agamemnon --

The Greek warlord -- and godlike Achilles.

cover photo: Into the Jaws of Death, June 6, 1944. Reproduced by courtesy of the U.S. Coast Guard.

Copyright 1997 by Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciencs -- Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984

An Enquiry Concerning The Principles Of Morals - pg. 135

It is indeed observable, that, among all uncultivated nations, who have not, as yet, had full experience of the advantages attending beneficence, justice, and the social virtues, courage is the predominant excellence; what is most celebrated by poets, recommended by parents and instructors, and admired bu the public in general. The ethics of HOMER are, in this particular, very different from those of FENELON, his elegant imitator; and such as were well suited to an age, when one hero, as remarked by THUCYDIDES, could ask another, without offence, whether he were a robber or not. Such also, very lately, was the system of ethics, which prevailed in many barbarouse parts of IRELAND; if we may credit SPENCER, in his judicious account of the state of that kingdom.