The Iliad does not end with the sacking of Troy. To hear the last four or five chapters of the Iliad, where Achilles goes to war against the Trojans, is a listening for the ages. I was swept up into the battle on the shores and walls of Troy, of listening to the stories of mighty Ajax, wizened Nestor, the warring Diamid (sp?), and other characters and actions. Achilles and Agammemnon's argument (over a woman) starts the storyline. The recording quality is excellent and Nescault's narration is very good. You really need to purchase both books together in order to get the full effect. In this case, it will be halfway into the Iliad. This is one of those purchases that you're glad you made about halfway into the book. In The Odyssey, in his perilous journey home after the Trojan War, Odysseus must pass through the land of the Cyclopes, encounter Circe the Enchantress, and face the terrible Charybdis and the six headed serpent Scylla.īoth epics are translated here by Samuel Butler. The Iliad, the first of Homer's epic poems, tells of the counsel of Nestor, Achilles's slaying of Hector, and the defeat of the Trojans by the Greeks. In this extraordinary two volume audio set, the glorious saga again unfolds, telling the story of courage and magical adventure in Ancient Greece. If Homer did in fact exist, this supposedly blind poet was from some region of Greek-controlled Asia-Minor and recited his poems at festivals and political assemblies.

These classic epics provided the basis for Greek education and culture throughout the classical age and formed the backbone of humane education through the birth of the Roman Empire and the spread of Christianity. Little is known about the Ancient Greek oral poet Homer, the supposed 8th century BC author of the world-read Iliad and his later masterpiece, The Odyssey.

Homer odyssey iliad