0:00:07.775,0:00:11.085
A close encounter with[br]a man-eating giant,

0:00:11.085,0:00:14.834
a sorceress who turns men into pigs,

0:00:14.834,0:00:18.345
a long-lost king taking back his thrown.

0:00:18.345,0:00:21.956
On their own, any of these make[br]great stories,

0:00:21.956,0:00:25.545
but each is just one episode[br]in The Odyssey,

0:00:25.545,0:00:32.895
a 12,000-line poem spanning years of[br]Ancient Greek history, myth, and legend.

0:00:32.895,0:00:36.046
How do we make sense [br]of such a massive text

0:00:36.046,0:00:39.995
that comes from and tells of a world[br]so far away?

0:00:39.995,0:00:44.095
The fact that we can read The Odyssey[br]at all is pretty incredible,

0:00:44.095,0:00:49.435
as it was composed before the Greek[br]alphabet appeared in the 8th century BCE.

0:00:49.435,0:00:52.156
It was made for listeners [br]rather than readers,

0:00:52.156,0:00:56.277
and was performed by oral poets[br]called rhapsodes.

0:00:56.277,0:01:00.476
Tradition identifies its author[br]as a blind man named Homer.

0:01:00.476,0:01:05.017
But no one definitively knows whether[br]he was real or legendary.

0:01:05.017,0:01:08.866
The earliest mentions of him occur[br]centuries after his era.

0:01:08.866,0:01:12.456
And the poems attributed to him[br]seem to have been changed

0:01:12.456,0:01:15.771
and rearranged many times[br]by multiple authors

0:01:15.771,0:01:19.207
before finally being written down[br]in their current form.

0:01:19.207,0:01:22.556
In fact, the word rhapsode means[br]stitching together,

0:01:22.556,0:01:27.616
as these poets combined existing stories,[br]jokes, myths, and songs

0:01:27.616,0:01:30.295
into a single narrative.

0:01:30.295,0:01:33.207
To recite these massive epics live,

0:01:33.207,0:01:35.697
rhapsodes employed a steady meter,

0:01:35.697,0:01:37.558
along with pneumonic devices,

0:01:37.558,0:01:42.198
like repetition of memorized passages[br]or set pieces.

0:01:42.198,0:01:46.057
These included descriptions of scenery[br]and lists of characters,

0:01:46.057,0:01:49.705
and helped the rhapsode keep[br]their place in the narrative,

0:01:49.705,0:01:54.157
just as a chorus or bridge of a song[br]helps us to remember the next verses.

0:01:54.157,0:01:56.868
Because most of the tales were familiar[br]to the audience,

0:01:56.868,0:02:00.548
it was common to see the sections[br]of the poem out of order.

0:02:00.548,0:02:02.858
At some point, the order [br]became set in stone

0:02:02.858,0:02:07.288
and the story was locked into place[br]as the one we read today.

0:02:07.288,0:02:11.508
But since the world has changed[br]a bit in the last several thousand years,

0:02:11.508,0:02:15.048
it helps to have some background[br]before jumping in.

0:02:15.048,0:02:20.179
The Odyssey itself is a sequel to Homer's[br]other famous epic, The Illiad,

0:02:20.179,0:02:22.821
which tells the story of the Trojan War.

0:02:22.821,0:02:27.158
If there's one major theme uniting[br]both poems, it's this:

0:02:27.158,0:02:32.349
do not, under any circumstances,[br]incur the wrath of the gods.

0:02:32.349,0:02:36.908
The Greek Pantheon is a dangerous mix[br]of divine power and human insecurity,

0:02:36.908,0:02:40.838
prone to jealousy and grudges[br]of epic proportions.

0:02:40.838,0:02:45.569
And many of the problems faced by humans[br]in the poems are caused by their hubris,

0:02:45.569,0:02:50.499
or excessive pride in believing themselves[br]superior to the gods.

0:02:50.499,0:02:52.797
The desire to please gods was so great

0:02:52.797,0:02:55.850
that the Ancient Greeks traditionally[br]welcomed all strangers

0:02:55.850,0:02:58.068
into their homes with generosity

0:02:58.068,0:03:01.969
for fear that strangers [br]might be gods in disguise.

0:03:01.969,0:03:05.200
This ancient code of hospitality[br]was called xenia.

0:03:05.200,0:03:10.320
It involved hosts providing their guests[br]with safety, food, and comfort,

0:03:10.320,0:03:14.910
and the guests returning the favor[br]with courtesy, and gifts if they had them.

0:03:14.910,0:03:17.551
Xenia has a significant role [br]in The Odyssey,

0:03:17.551,0:03:21.681
where Odysseus in his wanderings[br]is the perpetual guest,

0:03:21.681,0:03:27.330
while in his absence, his clever wife[br]Penelope plays non-stop host.

0:03:27.330,0:03:30.800
The Odyssey recounts all [br]of Odysseus's years of travel,

0:03:30.800,0:03:36.030
but the narrative begins in medias res,[br]in the middle of things.

0:03:36.030,0:03:40.922
Ten years after the Trojan War,[br]we find our hero trapped on an island,

0:03:40.922,0:03:46.341
still far from his native Ithaca and[br]the family he hasn't seen for 20 years.

0:03:46.341,0:03:51.511
Because he's angered the sea god Poseidon[br]by blinding his son, a cyclops,

0:03:51.511,0:03:56.271
Odysseus's passage home has been[br]fraught with mishap after mishap.

0:03:56.271,0:03:59.420
With trouble brewing at home[br]and gods discussing his fate,

0:03:59.420,0:04:04.468
Odysseus begins the account[br]of those missing years to his hosts.

0:04:04.468,0:04:07.031
One of the most fascinating things[br]about The Odyssey

0:04:07.031,0:04:10.551
is the gap between how little we know[br]about its time period

0:04:10.551,0:04:14.671
and the wealth of detail the text[br]itself contains.

0:04:14.671,0:04:17.422
Historians, linguists, and archeologists

0:04:17.422,0:04:20.433
have spent centuries [br]searching for the ruins of Troy

0:04:20.433,0:04:24.172
and identifying which islands[br]Odysseus visited.

0:04:24.172,0:04:28.921
Just like its hero, the 24-book epic[br]has made its own long journey

0:04:28.921,0:04:31.511
through centuries of myth and history

0:04:31.511,0:04:34.482
to tell us its incredible story today.