The Odyssey by Homer - ISBN: 9780143139379
Hardcover
Man battles gods, fate, and himself on epic, winding journey home.
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  • Hardcover

    560 pages

  • Release Date

    22 September 2026

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Summary

So begins Robert Fagles’s magnificent translation of The Odyssey, literature’s grandest evocation of an everyman’s journey through life. Odysseus’s reliance on his wit and wiliness for survival against divine and natural forces on his ten-year voyage home to Ithaca after the Trojan War is at once a timeless human story and an individual test of moral endurance.

Robert Fagles’s translation of The Odyssey, enhanced with maps, genealogy tables, and pronunciation guides, has been the touc…

Book Details

ISBN-13:9780143139379
ISBN-10:0143139371
Author:Homer, Robert Fagles, Bernard Knox
Publisher:Penguin Putnam Inc
Imprint:Penguin USA
Format:Hardcover
Number of Pages:560
Release Date:22 September 2026
Weight:686g
Dimensions:217mm x 150mm x 42mm
Series:A Penguin Classics Hardcover
What They're Saying

Critics Review

Praise for Robert Fagles Translation of The Odyssey

“Wonderfully readable… Just the right blend of roughness and sophistication.”—Ted Hughes

“Robert Fagles is the best living translator of ancient Greek drama, lyric poetry, and epic into modern English.”—Garry Wills, The New Yorker

“Mr. Fagles has been remarkably successful in finding a style that is of our time and yet timeless.”—Richard Jenkyns, The New York Times Book Review

About The Author

Homer

Homer

Homer was the poet who the Greeks believed singularly composed The Iliad and The Odyssey. Nothing is known of his life. While seven Greek cities claim the honor of being his birthplace, ancient tradition places him in Ionia, located in the eastern Aegean coast. His birthdate is undocumented as well, though most modern scholars place the composition of The Iliad and The Odyssey in the late eighth or early seventh century B.C.

Robert Fagles (1933-2008)

Robert Fagles was the Arthur W. Marks ‘19 Professor of Comparative Literature, Emeritus, at Princeton University. He received a National Humanities Medal in 2006 and won the Harold Morton Landon Translation Award from The Academy of American Poets twice, once for Homer’s The Iliad in 1991 and then again in 2007 for The Aeneid. His translations of Sophocles’s The Three Theban Plays, Aeschylus’s The Oresteia (nominated for a National Book Award), The Iliad (which also won an award from The Translation Center of Columbia University), and Homer’s The Odyssey are all published in Penguin Classics.

Bernard Knox (1914-2010)

Bernard Knox was Director Emeritus of Harvard’s Center for Hellenic Studies in Washington, D.C. He won the 1976-77 George Jean Nathan Award for Dramatic Criticism and the 1990 PEN/Spielvogel-Diamonstein Award for Essays Ancient and Modern. Knox fought in the Spanish Civil War and World War II; France decorated him with the Croix de Guerre for special operations behind German lines in 1944, and the US Army awarded him two Bronze Stars for combat in Italy. He also edited The Norton Book of Classical Literature, and collaborated with Robert Fagles on The Iliad, The Odyssey, The Aeneid, and The Three Theban Plays.

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