Homer, Odyssey XI: Edited with an Introduction, Translation, and Commentary

This is the only large-scale standalone edition of Odyssey XI in English. Other commentators have covered it as part of multi-volume editions covering the entire epic. Odyssey XI deals with Odysseus' visit to the world of the dead, a pivotal episode of stunning virtuosity within the poem and one with a huge later influence on writers such as Vergil and Dante. This is the longest and most detailed standalone edition in English. The text of this part of the poem is particularly rich in detail and dense in allusiveness so that practically every word calls for comment elucidating questions such as dialect, metre, style, myth, cult, genealogy, and geography. There is extensive discussion of parallels from other literatures. The editor's approach is not only to pay close attention to questions of traditional referentiality within epic but also to unearth how older connotations of words linger beneath surface phrasing, thus casting light on its relationship to the broader Indo-European poetic tradition. As one might expect from earlier works by the same editor, close attention is paid throughout to religious matters. Likewise, the book goes into particular detail on linguistic matters within Homeric Greek, a kind of language which is superficially apt to seem relatively simple on account of its paratactic syntax, but which is often found, on closer investigation, to be less than straightforward.