Homer : the very idea

**The story of our ongoing fascination with Homer, the man and the myth.** Homer, the great poet of the __Iliad__ and the __Odyssey__, is revered as a cultural icon of antiquity and a figure of lasting influence. But his identity is shrouded in questions about who he was, when he lived, and whether he was an actual person, a myth, or merely a shared idea. Rather than attempting to solve the mystery of this character, James I. Porter explores the sources of Homer’s mystique and their impact since the first recorded mentions of Homer in ancient Greece. __Homer: The Very Idea__ considers Homer not as a man, but as a cultural invention nearly as distinctive and important as the poems attributed to him, following the cultural history of an idea and of the obsession that is reborn every time Homer is imagined. Offering novel readings of texts and objects, the book follows the very idea of Homer from his earliest mentions to his most recent imaginings in literature, criticism, philosophy, visual art, and classical archaeology. "This is a book about Homer-who probably never existed but nonetheless survives as one of the most important authors in Western literature. Homer, like Shakespeare, has never ceased to be an object of fascination. Surely the greatest attraction to Homer lies not in his greatness as an author but in his utter mystery. Was there really a man, an author named Homer? In this corner are those who think that there was and that there existed Ur texts of The Iliad and The Odyssey. On the other side are those who view the blind Homer as an icon, a legend created and circulated in later centuries when values of authorship were finally codified. As one of the foremost Homerists, James Porter is uniquely qualified to write about these issues. It is important to stress that his book is not a reception study of the poetry of Homer. Rather, it is written for a broad array of general readers, scholars, and cultural pundits, and it explores the cultural value and, in a narrower sense, the history of a particular value in our culture (represented by "Homer"). Porter sees this value as a particular fascination and an uncertain cipher around which questions of meaning and identity come to be constructed. Porter suspects that with Homer the ancients and moderns have made a rather telling choice of object for contention, one that ceaselessly authorizes the imaginative work of culture"-- Provided by publisher Frontmatter -- Contents -- Note on Translations and Abbreviations -- List of Illustrations -- Timeline -- 1 Why Homer? -- 2 Who Was Homer? -- 3 Apotheosis or Apostasy? -- 4 What Did Homer See? -- 5 Why War? -- Acknowledgments -- Notes -- Further Reading -- Works Cited -- Index Contents 6 Note on Translations and Abbreviations 8 List of Illustrations 10 Timeline 12 1. Why Homer? 16 2. Who Was Homer? 56 3. Apotheosis or Apostasy? 99 4. What Did Homer See? 146 5. Why War? 190 Acknowledgments 234 Notes 236 Further Reading 266 Works Cited 270 Index 288