Homer
Entry updated 14 April 2025. Tagged: Author, Poet.
(circa 800 BCE-circa 700 BCE) The most famous of early Greek poets, whether or not one or more individuals, or a guild of homers who recited poetry, and whose birth and death dates remain speculative; his or their birth and death may have occurred between the dates given above. SamuelButler, inThe Authoress of the Odyssey (1897), argued for female authorship of theOdyssey, and RobertGraves, in his novelHomer's Daughter (1955), argued that a woman wrote both epics. Homer is generally supposed to be the author of theIliad, the tragedy of Achilleus (or Achilles), and (rather later) theOdyssey, the comedy of Odysseus's return; these were probably not written down until the sixth century BCE, and come to us from much later manuscripts, the earliest of which dates from the tenth century CE. JulianJaynes, inThe Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976), argues the case for at least two Homers, the author(s) of theIliad, the last and greatest presentation of pre-conscious bicameral man, and the much later author(s) of theOdyssey, with its portrait of Odysseus as the first self-conscious human being to be recognized and described in a work of art.
The most evocative element in theIliad within the focus of this encyclopedia may be the god-smith Hephaestus's forging of "automatoi", tripodal constructs that wheel themselves to various locations (Book 18) (seeRobots), though the Shield of Achilles, as forged by Hephaestus (Book 18, lines 478-608), has been read as an instructional prolepsis giving view of the troubled progress of theWar, and of civilization as a whole (seePrediction); W HAuden's "The Shield of Achilles" (October 1952Poetry) builds tellingly on this reading. TheOdyssey is not, of course, sf, but stands paradigmatically at the head of theProto SF genre of theFantastic Voyage. Though Odysseus's Great Wanderings traverse a greatArchipelago clearly not wholly mappable for later readers, it would be inaccurate to suggest that in Homer's day the Mediterranean was atabula rasa, any more than theSolar System is today; theIslands and coastlines visited by Odysseus range from the known (and recognizably named) to the imaginary (and perhaps first named here). TheOdyssey has understandably therefore served as a kind of first-millennium-BC template forPlanetary Romance, mainly through the compact vividness of Odysseus's own embedded first-person recounting of his adventures to the Phaiakians his hosts, in an exceedingly early prefiguring of what would become theClub Story, during the course of which most of the clearly legendary or manufactured locations he visits are iconically particularized. But the exploits and ordeals so depicted are retrospectively framed within the story of theHero's orAntihero's ultimately triumphal return (seeMysterious Stranger); theOdyssey does not end in a vision of horizons to explore, but in closure. Sequels (some examples are given below) tend to follow the hero into further realms.
Both theIliad and theOdyssey are retold in BrianStableford'sDies Irae trilogy beginning withThe Days of Glory (1971), and underpin DanSimmons'sIlium books,Ilium (2003) andOlympos (2005); TerenceHawkins'sThe Rage of Achilles (2009) takes solely from theIliad. TheOdyssey is more frequently drawn upon. AndrewLang'sHelen of Troy (1882) carries an ageing Odysseus to Egypt, a voyage replicated at least in part inThe World's Desire (1890) by Lang with H RiderHaggard, in which Helen is again visited; inOdysseia (1938; trans Kimon Friar asThe Odyssey: A Modern Sequel1958) by Nikos Kazantzakis (1883-1957), the aged hero quests relentlessly across the world for metaphysical solace, dying at last in what reads (very abstractly) like aLost World in an Antarctica described in terms evocative of Edgar AllanPoe'sNarrative of Arthur Gordon Pym (1838); in John CowperPowys'sAtlantis (1954), Odysseus makes a final journey across the Atlantic, ending in Manhattan. Episodes from theOdyssey are explicitly homaged in several sf novels, includingNegative Minus (1963) by R LFanthorpe (execrably),Space Chantey (1968 dos) by R ALafferty (notably and with rumbustious humour), andCross the Stars (1984) by David ADrake. [JC/PN]
Homer
borncirca 800 BCE
diedcirca 700 BCE
about the author (very highly selected)
- John CowperPowys.Homer and the Aether (London: Macdonald,1959) [metafiction: hb//W Stein]
- Albert B Lord.The Singer of Tales (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press/London: Oxford University Press,1960) [nonfiction: in the publisher'sHarvard Studies in Comparative Literature series: hb/]
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