Greek epic poem about Odysseus's ten-year voyage home from Troy and his violent reclaiming of his house and wife from rival suitors.
The Odyssey is an ancient Greek epic poem, traditionally attributed to Homer, that follows Odysseus, king of Ithaca, on his long and dangerous journey home after the Trojan War. It opens not at the war's end but ten years later, with Odysseus trapped on the island of the nymph Calypso while his son Telemachus faces a household overrun by suitors courting his mother Penelope in his father's absence. The gods intervene, and the story unfolds through a mix of divine council scenes, a young man's coming-of-age quest for news of his father, and Odysseus's own first-person account of his wanderings.
The middle books contain the famous adventures: the Cyclops Polyphemus blinded and outwitted in his cave, the witch-goddess Circe who turns men to swine, a journey to the edge of the underworld to consult the dead including the ghost of Achilles, the deadly song of the Sirens, and the strait between Scylla and Charybdis. These are told by Odysseus himself as a guest at the court of the Phaeacians, a narrative device that lets Homer frame the fantastical episodes as one man's testimony rather than straight narration. Odysseus loses every ship and companion before washing ashore alone on Ithaca.
The second half of the poem is domestic and violent rather than fantastical: disguised as a beggar, Odysseus tests the loyalty of his household, is recognized by his old nurse and his faithful dog, wins an archery contest the suitors cannot complete, and then slaughters the suitors who have been consuming his estate and pressuring his wife. The poem closes with reunions with Penelope and his aged father Laconia, and a final, uneasy peace imposed by the goddess Athena between Odysseus and the suitors' families. It matters as one of the foundational texts of Western literature, shaping later ideas of the journey narrative, disguised return, and the tension between fate, divine will, and human cunning (metis) as a heroic virtue distinct from Achilles' brute force in the Iliad.
“Tell me, Muse, of the man of many turns, who wandered far and wide after he sacked the sacred citadel of Troy.”
— Book 1 · read this chapter →
“How strange it is that mortals blame the gods! They say their troubles come from us, yet it is through their own recklessness that they suffer”
— Book 1 · read this chapter →
“Calypso, shining among goddesses, held me back there in her hollow caves, longing to have me as her husband”
— Book 9 · read this chapter →
“The first to come was the spirit of my companion Elpenor, for he had not yet been buried beneath the wide earth.”
— Book 11 · read this chapter →
“This contest, unwinnable, is finished. Now I will aim at another mark no man has yet struck, if I can hit it”
— Book 22 · read this chapter →
It is the story of Odysseus's ten-year journey home to Ithaca after the Trojan War, and of his son Telemachus and wife Penelope holding out against a household of suitors in his absence. The poem covers both his fantastical wanderings, told in flashback, and his violent return and revenge on the suitors.
Odysseus is the king of Ithaca, a Greek hero of the Trojan War known for his cunning, resourcefulness, and endurance rather than raw strength. The poem calls him 'the man of many turns,' and he survives his journey through tricks like outwitting the Cyclops Polyphemus and disguising himself as a beggar.
Odysseus and his men are trapped in the cave of the one-eyed Cyclops Polyphemus, who eats several of them. Odysseus blinds him and escapes by giving his name as 'Nobody' and hiding his men under sheep, though the act earns him the lasting anger of Polyphemus's father, Poseidon.
Odysseus, having returned home in disguise, wins a bow contest the suitors cannot complete and then kills all of them for consuming his household and courting his wife Penelope. The poem closes with his reunion with Penelope and his father Laertes, and a truce brokered by Athena to prevent a blood feud with the suitors' families.
In Book 11, Odysseus travels to the edge of the underworld on Circe's advice to consult the dead, including the prophet Tiresias, about how to get home. There he also meets the ghost of Achilles, who says he would rather be a poor man alive than rule over all the dead.
Penelope is Odysseus's wife, who fends off more than a hundred suitors for years through delaying tactics like unweaving a burial shroud she claims to be finishing. She only fully recognizes and accepts Odysseus after he proves knowledge of details only her husband would know.