The Odyssey

Homer’s Odyssey follows Odysseus on his long journey home to Ithaca after the Trojan War. Across ten years of wandering he faces shipwreck, monsters, divine hostility and temptation, while at home Penelope and Telemachus contend with the suitors who have taken over his household. The poem combines adventure and myth with enduring questions about identity, loyalty, hospitality, mortality and the meaning of homecoming.

Anthony Verity provides the translation in this 2026 Oxford World’s Classics hardback, with an introduction and notes by William Allan. A map, select bibliography, explanatory notes and an index of personal names help place the journey, its characters and its mythic world in context without getting in the way of the poem itself.