Invitation to World Literature
The Odyssey The Odyssey: Connections

In the Images of World Literature slideshow, you saw images inspired by The Odyssey. Here at Connections, you can find modern interpretations, analyses, and performances of Odysseus’ story. (See the translations and editions page for links to these.)
Movies/Popular Interpretations/TV/Performance
- Contempt — 1963 Jean-Luc Godard movie centered on a screenwriter trying to make a film adaptation of The Odyssey.
http://www.film.u-net.com/Movies/Reviews/Le_Mepris.html - Ulysses — 1951 movie starring Kirk Douglas.
http://www.amazon.com/Ulysses-Kirk-Douglas/dp/B00001ZWBJ - O Brother Where Art Thou? — A Coen brothers movie that retells the story of The Odyssey in the American South in the 1920s. Tim Blake Nelson, a speaker in the video, appears in this film.
http://www.amazon.com/O-Brother-Where-Art-Thou/dp/B00003CXRM/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1265645286&sr=1-1 - Ulysses 31 — Ulysses in space in this 1981 cartoon series by Bernard Deyries and Kyosuke Mikuriya.
http://www.amazon.com/Ulysses-31-Mysteries-Claude-Giraud/dp/B0000D0YTU/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1265645320&sr=1-3 - “A Black Odyssey” is a collection of collages by Romare Bearden. http://aculturalkaleidoscope.blogspot.com/2008/02/nylons-identity-crisis.html for details.
- Director Peter Hinton discusses bringing Derek Walcott’s Odyssey to the stage. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4tWppSngPQ
Music
- Symphony X — This band released a 21-minute musical interpretation of The Odyssey.
http://s0.ilike.com/play#Symphony+X:Inferno+%28Unleash+The+Fire%29:448043:m36849447 - “Calypso” — A song by American singer/songwriter Suzanne Vega.
http://www.last.fm/music/Suzanne+Vega/_/Calypso
Books
- Margaret Atwood, The Penelopiad, 2005. A novelistic revision of the epic story from the heroine’s perspective.
http://www.amazon.com/Penelopiad-Myth-Penelope-Odysseus-Myths/dp/1841957984/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645406&sr=8-1 - Nancy Felson-Rubin, Regarding Penelope: From Character to Poetics, 1994.
http://www.amazon.com/Regarding-Penelope-Character-Nancy-Felson/dp/0806129611/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645438&sr=1-1 - Norman Fischer, Sailing Home: Using Homer’s Odyssey to Navigate Life’s Perils and Pitfalls, 2008. The author, a Zen Buddhist master, uses The Odyssey as a touchstone for his own guide to wisdom in living.
http://www.amazon.com/Sailing-Home-Odyssey-Navigate-Pitfalls/dp/B002ECEHM4/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645459&sr=1-1 - Robert Fitzgerald (translator) Virgil’s Aeneid. The great Roman epic. Its first half recasts Odysseus’s wanderings to tell the story of Aeneas, who escapes the burning Troy to fulfill his destiny and found Rome.
http://www.amazon.com/Aeneid-Everymans-Library-Virgil/dp/0679413359/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645723&sr=1-1 - Edith Hall, The Return of Ulysses: A Cultural History of Homer’s Odyssey, 2008.
http://www.amazon.com/Return-Ulysses-Cultural-History-Odyssey/dp/0801888697 - Ralph Hexter, A Guide to The Odyssey, 1993.
http://www.amazon.com/Guide-Odyssey-Commentary-Translation-Fitzgerald/dp/0679728473/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645497&sr=1-1 - Richard Lattimore (translator) The Iliad of Homer. The great companion work giving the story of the Trojan War before Odysseus’s return home.
http://www.amazon.com/Iliad-Homer/dp/0226469409/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645520&sr=1-1 - Albert B. Lord, The Singer of Tales, 2nd edition, 2000. Includes a CD of modern epic performances by illiterate Serbian bards; key to understanding ancient epic techniques of composition and performance.
http://www.amazon.com/Singer-Tales-Albert-B-Lord/dp/0674002830/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645545&sr=1-1 - Seth Schein, Reading the Odyssey, 1991.
http://www.amazon.com/Reading-Odyssey-Seth-L-Schein/dp/0691044392/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645560&sr=1-1 - Dan Simmons, Ilium, 2005. Sci-fi novel combining the story of The Odyssey and The Iliad with a space-age story.
http://www.amazon.com/Ilium-Dan-Simmons/dp/0380817926/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645581&sr=1-1 - Alfred Lord Tennyson, “Ulysses,” a poem in blank verse written in 1833 by the English poet laureate. Tennyson imagines that after he has successfully returned home to Ithaca, Odysseus/Ulysses longs to travel again.
http://www.amazon.com/Tennyson-Including-Eaters-Ulysses-Passing/dp/1417912596/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645641&sr=1-1 - William G. Thalmann, The Odyssey: An Epic of Return, 1997.
http://www.amazon.com/Odyssey-Twaynes-Masterwork-Studies-Companion/dp/0805785647/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645661&sr=1-1 - Roy Thomas, The Odyssey (Marvel Illustrated), 2009. (Interviewed in The Odyssey video).
http://www.amazon.com/Odyssey-Marvel-Illustrated-Roy-Thomas/dp/0785119086. - Carol G. Thomas and Craig Conant, The Trojan War, 2005. This is a clear and interesting discussion of up to date archaeological understanding of the Mediterranean Bronze Age in relation to the Trojan War. It includes a set of primary documents from places like Egypt, a discussion of events in The Iliad and The Odyssey in relation to archeological discoveries, and more. It is aimed at a general reader and/or student of matters Trojan.
http://www.amazon.com/Trojan-War-Carol-G-Thomas/dp/0806138742/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645701&sr=1-1 - Derek Walcott, Omeros, 1990. A magnificent verse novel by the Nobel Prize-winning Caribbean poet, setting a version of Homer’s epic struggles on Walcott’s home island of Saint Lucia.
http://www.amazon.com/Omeros-Derek-Walcott/dp/0571144594/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265645740&sr=1-1