Off the Cuff / My Other Journal

Odyssey...What's in a name?

Nope, I'm not going to talk about the "Odyssey Dawn," the weird title given to the military operation in Libya. What's in this name? Just bad PR. Obviously, no one in the Pentagon read the true Odyssey, or else, they wouldn't give such a name to a supposedly short-term operation. In the Odyssey, Odysseus -due to Poseidon's fury upon him- had a complicated journey and a very difficult time (20 years altogether with the Iliad adventures) to reach Ithaca, his destination.

Taking off from our present day follies, I want to mention a set of ten CDs I borrowed from our local library, The Odyssey by Homer read by John Lee, the actor, director, writer who has read more than eighty books for Random House.

It was such an enjoyable Odyssey for me to listen and appreciate not only the reader's voice and skill but also the writer's and the translator's talents. Homer has used most of the novel tools (foreshadowing, good scene composition, voice, proper pacing etc.) that we try to use in our craft. Sometimes, his language is colorful, sometimes straight. I enjoyed that he used the same phrase all through the Odyssey for when it became morning. Today, we may say, "the dawn broke" or "the dawn's first lights appeared in the horizon." Homer said, "Daughter of the morning, rosy-fingered dawn appeared." And he kept saying the same phrase for each morning.

In case some of us want to write stories of Ancient Greece of 3000 years ago, here are a few things from that culture I picked up:

In those times, last names being non-existent, everyone was called by their father's name, which has been the custom in Middle East until a short time ago. For example: "Odysseus Son of Laertes," even to his face when addressing him, and for another person, using the same style during an address.

It amazed me that they ate so much meat, which probably has nothing to do with today's Mediterranean Diet.

They served wine by mixing it with water.

No one went to wash their hands, but the slave-servants brought water and a basin to the dinner table and washed the diners' hands.

For bathing, people did not wash themselves but were washed by their servants and oiled afterwards. How the servants did those things for themselves, I have no idea, but it was common practice to kidnap people especially from the conquered lands and sell them as slave-servants.

If you can find it in your school's library or in the local library or want to purchase it, I recommend this version of The Odyssey highly. I had so much fun listening to it. Maybe the synopsis in Random House's website will give a better idea.

Synopsis from the Random House's website:

"Most translations of The Odyssey are in the kind of standard verse form believed typical of high-serious composition in the ancient world. Yet some scholars believe the epic was originally composed in a less formal, phrase-by-phrase prosody. Charles Stein employs the latter approach in this dramatic, and in some ways truer, version. Famous episodes such as the sirens, Scylla and Charybdis, and the Cyclops, are rendered with previously unseen energy and empathy. The poem’s second half—where Odysseus, returned home to take revenge on his wife’s suitors—has extraordinarily subtle, “novelistic” features that are made more transparent in this version. There is also a special feel for the archaic dimensions of Homer—the world of gods and their complex relations to Fate and Being that other translators tend to deemphasize in order to make the poem feel “modern.” Most versions exclude or minimize the magical aspects of the poem, but Stein gives these elements full play, so that the spirit of a universe predating the classical era shines through. This vibrant version of The Odyssey shows readers not only what the Greeks thought about their gods but the gods themselves. Summaries preceding each chapter and a list of recommended websites help expand the experience.”