The Odyssey is the hot topic for the summer of 2026. At Kosmos Society we have discussed the epic over the years, so here are just a few of the article posts, videos, and learning resources for those who wish to explore further.
You can find a copy of the poem in the Text Library.
Articles
This is a selection of posts written by community members about aspects of the characters and themes found in the Homeric Odyssey.
Eurycleia and Anticleia: the two women who jointly raised Odysseus have very similar names
A Most Dangerous Sea and the Beauteous Scarf: the role of Ino, also known as Leukothea
Penelope: her husband missing, she is not a widow, yet her house is full of suitors
Nestor’s Epic Success? in the Odyssey we see Nestor at home in Pylos
Homeric Ithaca: the theory of Robert Bittlestone about Kefalonia as the Ithaca of the Odyssey
From Scheria to Ithaca: we share this paper by Douglas Frame (2017)
Divine Doppelgänger – Hermes and Odysseus: “Odysseus took the seat that Hermes had just left”
The improvised craft: construction methods for ancient vessels and the ‘raft’ of Odysseus
Troy: Myth and Reality, The British Museum | Part 2: Frescos, the Horse, Odysseus, and written transmission: includes images from the Odyssean tradition
Gallery | Odyssey 22: The Slaying of the Suitors: visual depictions of this episode, also known as the Mnēstērophoníā
Video discussions
The Open House discussions with visiting scholars include conversations about the Odyssey. Here is a selection:
- Ares, Aphrodite, and a Monkey’s Rump: Some Thoughts on Public Humiliation, with Prof. Christopher Brown
- The Odyssey, “Breaking Bad,” and Problematic Endings, with Joel Christensen
- The Children of Odysseus, and Multiformity, with Joel Christensen
- On the Odyssey, Kingship, and Nestor, with Gregory Nagy, Douglas Frame and Leonard Muellner
- Nostos, names, and the younger generation of heroes, with Gregory Nagy (transcript only)
- Odyssey or the Return of a Song, with Ioanna Papadopoulou
- The narrative form of the Odyssey, with Kevin McGrath
- Penelope & Weaving, with Olga Levaniouk
- Dialogue: Ancient Greek Brides, Death, and Exchange, with Olga Levaniouk
- The Dreams of Barchin and Penelope, with Olga Levaniouk
- The relevance of Odysseus’ words about kingship in Odyssey 8, with Leonard Muellner and Douglas Frame
- Exchanges in the Odyssey‘s Underworld, with Nancy Felson, Laura Slatkin, and Maša Ćulumović
- Odysseus and the Poetics of katábasis, with Stamatia Dova
- Confessions of murder in the Odyssey, with Eunice Kim
- Gift of tripods in Odyssey 13, with Douglas Frame
- Looking Backward: Through the Lens of Odyssey 24, with Gregory Nagy
Reading Homeric Greek
In this series of videos Gregory Nagy, Leonard Muellner, and Douglas Frame read, translate and discuss small passages of the Odyssey in the original Greek in the most accessible way. If you’ve ever dreamed of reading Homer in the original, here is your chance to do so with teachers who have spent a lifetime thinking about this poetry.
- Homeric Greek | Iliad 1.1–9: The poetry of grammar, the grammar of poetry
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.1–10: Starting to begin the Odyssey
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.11–26: Threads of song
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.27–43
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.44–62: Athena, Odysseus, and longing for home
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.63–79: Polyphemus, traditions of the Cyclopes, Poseidon and Zeus
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.80–92: Epithets of gods, of cattle, of Achaeans, and of Odysseus
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.93–98: Variants in Telemachus’ visits, Nestor, and Athena
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.99–112: Athena at the threshold
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.113–117: Teleachus visualizing his father
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.118–124: xeinos as stranger and as guest
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.125–135: Receiving a guest, and seating arrangements
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.136–143: Dining, and serving food
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.144–148: Couches, chairs, and camera’s choreography
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.149–155: Desire for food and drink, and Homeric stringed instruments
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.156–162: Rotting bones, neglected rules of reciprocity, and powers of particles
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.163–168: Comparatives, the lost homecoming, and Telemachus’ misery
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.169–177, part 1: call him to keînos
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.169–177, part 2: Epiphanies and Athena’s travels
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.178–186: Multiple versions, wine-bright sea, and blazing iron
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.187–193: Rattling around in enjambments
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.194–202: Wild men holding Odysseus back
- Homeric Greek | Odyssey 1.203–212: Are you really from Odysseus, big boy that you are
- Homeric Greek: Odyssey 1.213–220: Inspiring Telemachus
- Homeric Greek: Odyssey 1.221–229: What’s the feast? It’s not a potluck
- Homeric Greek: Odyssey 1.230–238: Invisible man, skein of war and movable nu
- Homeric Greek: Odyssey 1.239–251: Harpies, suitors and all the Achaeans
- Homeric Greek: Odyssey 1.252–256: At the front gates
- Homeric Greek: Odyssey 1.255–267: Wish or condition?
Learning Homeric Greek
If you’d like to start learning ancient Greek, we have resources to facilitate self-study or study groups, for those who are learning ancient Greek, or who wish to engage with and explore ancient Greek texts.
Members of Kosmos Society are running community study groups associated with these resources to support each others’ learning. If you are interested in taking part, please post in the Forum. If you are not currently a member, please complete the application form (at the bottom of the Home page) with some information about yourself, to request an invitation code.
Please visit the Greek Learning Modules page to explore further.
HeroesX Office Hours
HeroesX, also known as The Ancient Greek Hero, is an intergenerational, open-access course (though we prefer to call it a learning project) created by Professor Gregory Nagy and first launched in 2013. It grew out of Harvard’s longest-running course, which Nagy has taught for over fifty years.
The project is now being relaunched at the New Alexandria Foundation.
https://continuum.fas.harvard.edu/heroesx/
Office Hours discussions from earlier iterations are available on the Kosmos Society YouTube channel. These are some of the videos that relate to the Odyssey:
HeroesX v06 Office Hours 06 | Consciousness, Homecoming, and a Boeotian Odysseus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OEvIgNY2JA
HeroesX v07 Office Hours 05 | What’s Special about Odysseus?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8JnPZCkkm4
HeroesX v07 Office Hours 06 | Odysseus, Penelope and Recognition Scenes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37VM_WhIp78
HeroesX v07 Office Hours 07 | Right and Wrong, Penelope’s Weaving, Homer and Hesiod
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxJzYYtGUeI
HeroesX v08 Office Hours 05 | Odysseus among the Phaeacians
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ts5w5clOAiI
HeroesX v08 Office Hours 07 | The End of the Odyssey
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufMGg_b_lTU
HeroesX v09 Office Hours 05 | The Opening of the Odyssey
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tZlmR_XvdiY
HeroesX v09 Office Hours 07 | Odysseus on Ithaca and Beyond
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeTL2YoAfR8
HeroesX v09 Office Hours Extras 02 | Speech Acts, Women in Epic, Integration of Opposites
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpjKTVxn_uc
HeroesX v10 Office Hours 06 | Does the Odyssey Ever End?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmVxRSp5tIg
HeroesX v11 Office Hours 05 | Odysseus the Violator of Protocols
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47DLauJIoS0
HeroesX v11 Office Hours 06 | The Shock of Pollution and the Joy of Apollo’s Feast
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgLlyvs6i4w
HeroesX v13 Office Hours 05 | Odysseus: Bad Press All Around?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQb-RB8eUK8
HeroesX v14 Office Hours 06 | The (In)Completeness of Odyssey and the Prophecy of Teiresias
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDyjyvhvSjg
HeroesX v15 Office Hours 05 | Odysseus, Noos and Nostos
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQMlg57lAoY
Please explore other Office Hours videos.
Image credits
Featured image: Francesco Hayez: Odyssseus at the court of Alcinous 1814–1815.
public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Photos: Kosmos Society