Approaches to Homer’s ‘Iliad’ and ‘Odyssey’ consists of ten original essays on the Iliad and Odyssey by established Homeric scholars and university professors of Greek literature and culture. The anthology offers not only fresh approaches to reading, appreciating, and understanding these Homeric epics, but also attempts to make a case why these works are still relevant in the twenty-first century. Both epics are required reading in most college/university general and world literature courses, as is evident from their inclusion in part or in whole in many standard world literature anthologies. These ten new approaches to the first literary works of Western culture are intended as reading aids for both instructors and students in any college/university classroom in which either of these two Homeric epics are taught.

The Editor: Kostas Myrsiades is Professor of Comparative Literature and English at West Chester University in Pennsylvania. He is a distinguished translator and neohellenist and the first American to receive the Gold Medallion for his translations from the Hellenic Society of Translators of Literature. His work in Greek letters is not only demonstrated in his 18 published books and numerous articles on modern and ancient Greek literature but also in the many invited lectures he has delivered for such groups as the Jane Globus Seminar Series Lecture at Baruch College, the Elytis Chair Lecture Series of Poetry and Neohellenic Studies at Rutgers, and the Embassy of Greece/National Library of Canada Lecture at Ottawa. He is the editor of College Literature, a quarterly of literary criticism, theory, and pedagogy, which has been the recipient of six awards from the Council of Editors of Learned Journals, including the Phoenix Award for distinguished editorial achievement.