Homer · Probably composed around 725 to 675 BC
Odysseus‘s ten-year struggle to get home after the Trojan War, and the story of his wife Penelope and son Telemachus waiting for him on Ithaca.
Classic public-domain translations: Samuel Butler (1900), A. T. Murray (1919). Read a full translation
Read it part by part
- Book 1: A house full of suitors. Athena visits Telemachus and tells him to act.
- Book 2: The assembly. Telemachus confronts the suitors and secretly sails away.
- Book 3: Nestor at Pylos. Telemachus hears how the heroes came home.
- Book 4: Menelaus and Helen. In Sparta, Telemachus learns his father is trapped on an island.
- Book 5: Calypso's island. Odysseus is set free and shipwrecked.
- Book 6: Nausicaa. A princess finds Odysseus on the beach.
- Book 7: The palace of Alcinous. Odysseus is welcomed by the Phaeacian king and queen.
- Book 8: Games and songs. Odysseus weeps at a song about Troy.
- Book 9: The Cyclops. Odysseus tells of the Cyclops Polyphemus.
- Book 10: Aeolus and Circe. The winds escape, and Circe turns the men into pigs.
- Book 11: The land of the dead. Odysseus speaks with the ghosts.
- Book 12: Sirens, Scylla and the cattle of the Sun. Odysseus loses every one of his men.
- Book 13: Home to Ithaca. The Phaeacians take Odysseus home, and Athena disguises him.
- Book 14: The loyal swineherd. Odysseus stays with Eumaeus.
- Book 15: Telemachus comes home. Telemachus escapes the ambush.
- Book 16: Father and son. Odysseus reveals himself to Telemachus.
- Book 17: The beggar at the palace. Odysseus returns home in disguise.
- Book 18: The fight with Irus. Odysseus beats a beggar, and Penelope charms the suitors.
- Book 19: Penelope and the beggar. The old nurse recognises Odysseus by his scar.
- Book 20: Signs of doom. Omens warn the suitors.
- Book 21: The contest of the bow. Only Odysseus can string his bow.
- Book 22: The battle in the hall. Odysseus takes his revenge.
- Book 23: Penelope's test. Husband and wife are reunited.
- Book 24: Peace. Odysseus meets his father, and Athena ends the fighting.