1. The Odyssey

2. The Odyssey Background Info There will be a quiz over this information
It is an epic poem.
An epic is a long, narrative poem that tells the adventures of heroes.

3. Homer A blind poet wrote The Iliad and The Odyssey.
They are the two most famous epic poems composed by him.
They were written between B.C.

4. The Iliad details the ten
year Trojan War
Between the Trojans and
the Greeks over the
kidnapping of Helen, the
Queen of Greece, by
Paris, the Prince of
Troy. The Iliad is also
known as a war epic.

5. The Odyssey details the ten year journey
by Odysseus, a Trojan War hero. He is
returning to his home of Ithaca. His story is
known as a journey epic.
His wife is Penelope.
His son is Telemachus.
He thought of the wooden horse trick.
He is considered a hero.
He is King of Ithaca.
He has hubris, a the tragic flaw. It is “the sin of too much pride”.

6. Beware of Greeks bearing gifts.
The Trojan Horse
A.K.A.: ”The wooden horse trick”
Beware of Greeks bearing gifts.

7. Types of People in Greece
Humans-“Ordinary people on earth”
Heroes-Special class or aristocrats located between gods and humans
Gods-Believed to cause certain events in the world; people needed a reason for things happening in their lives.
Rhapsodes-”Singers of tales”; they were historians and entertainers as well as the myth-makers of their time

8. Myths… are stories that use fantasy to express ideas about life that
cannot be expressed
easily in realistic
terms.

9. Mt. Olympus -Home of the gods and goddesses “Media Res” -Latin phrase that means the narrator begins the tale in the “middle of things”
As the story begins, Telemachus is 20 years old, threatened by opposing forces at home, and seeking his father. Odysseus is stranded on an island trying to find his way home; it has been 20 years since he left Ithaca.