CLA204H5 Lecture 10: CLA204 - Lecture 10
Document Summary
Early critics believed there was a single poet who wrote the iliad and the odyssey. But then he realized there was a difference in tone and plot. Some believe iliad was a work of homer"s young effort but that the odyssey was from his old age. Samuel butler: 19 century said the iliad was composed by a man and the odyssey was composed by a woman. Most people say the debate is misguided; that the two works emerged from the same tradition (the repeated recitation of stories through generations) Clear indications that whoever was responsible for the composition of the odyssey knows the iliad and is expanding that world - may be the same person/people. Thy are both epic form and in the same meter (dactylic hexameter) They have the same turn of phrase; composed in language in which one would not write (usually colloquial) In the iliad, songs become material for singers in the odyssey.
