The Odyssey - Manual of Secret Teachings?

[Slow Motion Mary]

Read it years ago in high school before the curriculum was change to include stuff like "Flowers for Algernon" and "Jonathan Livingston Seagull".  Homer's "Iliad" was next on my list, but I'll swap it for "The Odyssey" to keep up.  I get my classics from Internet Classics Archive at classics.mit.edu.  Anyone know anything about this source?  Seems okay.  Would everyone be interested in reading "The Odyssey" and keeping in mind "ring composition"?  This year's first quarter issue of "Parabola" digest*, which I picked up to read about "suffering" and it had an interesting article on ring composition:  "The earliest extant writing, works such as the Avesta of Zoroaster, the books of the Hebrew Bible, the Vedas in India, and Homer's narratives in Greece, were all written in a non-linear synoptic style.  In ring or annular composition, each chapter, or each segment of the story, has a non-local relation that does not follow in linear sequence.  Rather than being in linear order, the segments are related in a circle and each piece relates, not to the one before or after it, but rather to the one across the circle from it."  I thought this style of writing might illuminate why the Old Testament is so difficult to read so I am working on an outline of "Genesis" which I wanted to share with everybody.  I picked "Genesis" instead of Homer's work because it is more familiar to me.  I am not done with it yet, but when I'm done I'll post the outline and go from there, if there is interest.  *Parabola is a quarterly digest that focuses on themes common to different spiritual traditions.  You'll find Christianity, Judaism, Sufism, Buddhism, etc., as well as book reviews.

[Johnno]

I have only read The Iliad. Should be able to pick up a copy at the multitude of bookshops around here.

[Mac]

I read it in high school lit class many years ago. One the good things I remember about school then was reading such classics.
Tale of Two Cities, Les Miserbles, Shakespeare's plays.

Time to give it another look.

Mac

[rylek]

Also 'guilty' of not having read it.

[3D Student]

I read it in high school and don't really remember it. This reading assignment is quite fitting as I just finished Gnosis 3 today. I think I might go with the audio files, I've never "read" a book by the audio file. Is the Butler translation good?

[the_hammer]

I have only read the Iliad and a few snippets from the Odyssey in high school but unfortunately I have forgotten most of it

[Renaissance]

I haven't read it but I've been wanting to for a while. I'll be reading the Robert Fitzgerald translation and I also will be skimming through 'A Guide to the Odyssey' by Ralph Hexter which also looks at the Fitzgerald translation. Harold Bloom also wrote "Homer's The Odyssey" which looks like it has some interesting insights as well. 

[Bar Kochba]

In the past I have looked at the cover and read the blurbs. Now I will open it and begin reading on page 1. This is very interesting!

[ignis.intimus]

Not I.

[go2]

I picked up used copies of Richmond Lattimore's and Robert Fitzgerald's translations this afternoon. Used classic paper covers are six dollars a piece, so I can afford to compare the translations. It will be stimulating to take a break from The Polyvagal Theory and read The Odyssey. Perhaps The Odyssey can be an allegorical journey into the neurophysiological foundations of I AM.  

[l_autre_d]

good timing, just finished Darkness Over Tibet and looking for the next good book.

[Gandalf]

I read it many years ago and i saw the movie.

French version:

_http://www.inlibroveritas.net/telecharger/pdf_domaine_public/oeuvre1539.html

_http://www.iliadeodyssee.com/ebook/iliade_odyssee.pdf

[Prometeo]

The Odyssey of homer? That's supposedly one of the books with an extense vocabulary, at least in spanish with Don Quijote.

[JP]

Actually I  just finished reading the Odyssey along with the Iliad. I really enjoyed it but I must say that most of the deeper meaning must have passed me by. Look forward to reading it again with some new insights.

[Masamune]

It was assigned and taught at my high school but I do not know how much I actually read of the material.  I took a college mythology class a few years ago which covered various different topics. 

You know, that makes me think of the standard High School curriculum and how they include certain books that normally one would think of as damaging to TPTB.  I'm thinking mainly of Orwell's 1984 and how it's almost a rite of passage for high schoolers to read that book.  But maybe The Odyssey, if approached from the angle Laura mentioned, could be considered in a similar way.

It also reminds me of how G said that by presenting concepts of the Work to somebody who wasn't seeking it would turn that person off from ever wanting to take part in the Work. 

It makes me wonder if reading certain books at an age when we're not ready to 'digest' them keeps us from looking deeper into the whole mess we're in on the BBM.  It's that thinking: "Well, I've already read that, nothing to see here!"

Yeah I think that is a good opportunity to teach kids how they want them to view these important works.  Why not get to the kids first before they become interested in this material on their own?  For me personally school took all the fun and excitement out of learning about these topics by over intellectualizing them or by giving incorrect interpretations of the symbolism/meaning of the mythology.

I think I will be checking out the audiobook version.  Thanks for the link!