Homer's Odyssey: A Companion to the Translation of Richmond Lattimore

by Peter V. Jones

A commentary with an introduction that describes the features of oral poetry and discusses the history of the text of the Odyssey.

Jones provides a line-by-line commentary that explains the many factual details, mythological allusions, and Homeric conventions that a student or general reader could not be expected to bring to an initial encounter with the Odyssey. His notes also enhance an appreciation of the Odyssey by illuminating epic style, Homer’s methods of composition, his characterization, and the structure of the work.

239 pages, Hardcover

Published October 1, 1989

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Peter Jones (sometimes credited as Peter V. Jones) is a former lecturer in Classics at the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne, a writer and journalist. Jones has regularly written on Classics for major newspapers, and was awarded the MBE in 1983. He is a Cambridge graduate.

Jones' popular work has been focused on introducing new generations to Ancient Rome and Greece, from newspaper columns to crossword collections, popular non-fiction, and charitable organisations devoted to helping keep Classics subjects in schools.

Reviews

[Tim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Essential. Jones' companion to The Odyssey as translated by Richmond Lattimore really brought the epic to life. I appreciated all the context, both literary and historical. The nature of oral poetry and epic poetry is illuminated with Jones' explanations. The writing is forthright and clear without being dry or dull.

The only caution I would make is that Jones does show the reader how certain events in The Odyssey are linked. In doing so, he sometimes refers to future events in The Odyssey, revealing outcomes before they are reached in the reading. Since I was reading the story through for the first time, some of the suspense was removed for me because Jones had revealed the outcome. This was balanced by the greater knowledge/context I had when reading and if I had it to do over again, I would use the same approach, reading the Jones chapter after finishing the chapter in The Odyssey.

[MyChienneLit · Rating 4 out of 5]

Is this book interesting for the average reader? No. But it is an absolute gem for anyone studying The Odyssey. I highly, highly recommend it for anyone reading Homer in an academic setting or a book club and using an edition of Lattimore that doesn’t have footnotes. Mine didn’t—I don’t know if there are other editions of Lattimore with footnotes or not, but in addition to giving context and additional information, this book helpfully explains some errors in translation that make some lines much easier to decipher. It is organized by book and line so it’s easy to flip to the section you want to follow along or look up an entry. If you’re just reading the poem for pleasure, this volume is unnecessary. But if you’re slow reading or studying in an academic setting using Lattimore’s translation and you’re not a classics scholar, it’s essential.

[James Klagge · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this in conjunction with Lawrence of Arabia's translation of The Odyssey. This commentary is a scholarly work, while that translation is not a scholarly one--lacking even line numbers. So I used the commentary more loosely, to get a sense of the scholarly issues that get raised. This added to my appreciation of the story--but not a lot. Each chapter has an overview of the book in question, and then a line-by-line account of issues that arise in that book. I would read the overview, and then read the Lawrence translation, and then read through the line-by-line comments. This way the comments did not detract from my experience of the story.
I have read similar commentaries for the Iliad A Companion to The Iliad: Based on the Translation by Richmond Lattimore, the Brothers Karamazov A Karamazov Companion: Commentary on the Genesis, Language, and Style of Dostoevsky's Novel, and an annotated edition of Walden Walden. I used the first two in a similar fashion, and was glad to have had them. But the annotated edition of Walden had the annotations for passages in the margin--so you were always looking at them along with the text. That completely detracted from the reading experience for me.
While I appreciated reading the commentary, it never felt like a revelation. And I generally felt I could have gotten nearly as much without it. Often it would remark on things that one could well figure out for oneself.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

Helpful notes on ancient Greek society, referenced mythology, and explanations for some of Lattimore's more obtuse word choices in his translation of The Odyssey. I used this text and The Oxford Dictionary of Classical Myth and Religion to keep track of the the various mythological entities that made their way into Homer's narrative. I found Peter Jones' work very enlightening in my reading of The Odyssey.