The Odyssey (Wordsworth Classics) by Homer, trans. George Chapman (2002)

The Odyssey (Wordsworth Classics) presents Homer's great epic in George Chapman's celebrated 1616 translation, describing the many adventures of Odysseus, Greek warrior, as he strives over many years to return to his home island of Ithaca after the Trojan War. This poem has been translated many times over the years, but Chapman's sinewy, gorgeous rendering stands in a class of its own.

Key topics include Odysseus's colorful adventures, his endurance, and his love for his wife and son, which have the same power to move and inspire readers today as they did in Archaic Greece 2,800 years ago. Chapman believed himself inspired by the spirit of Homer, matching the breadth and power of the original with a complex and stunning poetic idiom entirely his own.

John Keats famously expressed his admiration for Chapman's translation in the sonnet "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer," which begins, "Much have I travelled in the realms of gold." This Wordsworth Classics edition includes an exclusive introduction and notes by Adam Roberts of Royal Holloway, University of London, placing Chapman's masterpiece in the context of its own day and discussing its lasting influence on later poets.

This affordable edition is well suited to students of English literary history and readers interested in experiencing the Odyssey through one of the earliest and most historically significant English translations, alongside scholarly context that illuminates its enduring influence on English poetry.

ISBN-13: 978-1853260254