Quotes from Homer

Oh, mother! since thy son To early death by destiny is doom'd, I might have hop'd the Thunderer on high, Olympian Jove, with honour would have crown'd My little space; but now disgrace is mine; Since Agamemnon, the wide-ruling King, Hath wrested from me, and still holds, my prize. Weeping, he spoke; his Goddess-mother heard, Beside her aged father where she sat In the deep ocean-caves: ascending quick Through the dark waves, like to a misty cloud, Beside her son she stood; and as he wept, She

What I say will be a bit of boasting. The mad wine tells me to do it. Wine sets even a thoughtful man to singing, or sets him into softly laughing, sets him to dancing. Sometimes it tosses out a word that was better unspoken.

Odysseus is a migrant, but he is also a political and military leader, a strategist, a poet, a loving husband and father, an adulterer, a homeless person, an athlete, a disabled cripple, a soldier with a traumatic past, a pirate, thief and liar, a fugitive, a colonial invader, a home owner, a sailor, a construction worker, a mass murderer, and a war hero.

so as the great Achilles rampaged on, his sharp-hoofed stallions trampled shields and corpses, axle under his chariot splashed with blood, blood on the handrails sweeping round the car, sprays of blood shooting up from the stallions' hoofs and churning, whirling rims—and the son of Peleus charioteering on to seize his glory, bloody filth splattering both strong arms, Achilles' invincible arms—

The creations of genius always seem like miracles, because they are, for the most part, created far out of the reach of observation.

You are indeed a man of sorrows and have suffered much...pray be seated now, here on this chair, and let us leave our sorrows, bitter though they are, locked up in our own hearts, for weeping is cold comfort and does little good.

I would disapprove of another hospitable man who was excessive in friendship, as of one excessive in hate. In all things balance is better.

We men are wretched things, and the gods, who have no cares themselves, have woven sorrow into the very pattern of our lives...Zeus the Thunderer has two jars standing on the floor of his palace, in which he keeps his gifts, the evils in one and the blessings in the other.

there is nothing nobler or more admirable than when two people who see eye to eye keep house as man and wife...

The shock of encountering an ancient author speaking in largely recognizable language can make him seem more strange, and newly strange. I would like to invite readers to experience a sense of connection to this ancient text, while also recognizing its vast distance from our own place and time. Homer is, and is not, our contemporary.

The Greek word epos means simply "word" or "story" or "song." It is related to a verb meaning "to say" or "to tell," which is used (in a form with a prefix) in the first line of the poem. The narrator commands the Muse, "Tell me": enn-epe. An epic poem is, at its root, simply a tale that is told.

I have endured what no one on earth has ever done before—I put to my lips the hands of the man who killed my son.

Impressive displays of rhetoric and linguistic force are a good way to seem important and invite a particular kind of admiration, but they tend to silence dissent and discourage deeper modes of engagement.

To form correct views of individuals we must regard them as forming parts of a great whole — we must measure them by their relation to the mass of beings by whom they are surrounded, and, in contemplating the incidents in their lives or condition which tradition has handed down to us, we must rather consider the general bearing of the whole narrative, than the respective probability of its details.

There are no binding oaths between men and lions— wolves and lambs can enjoy no meeting of the minds— they are all bent on hating each other to the death. So with you and me. No love between us. No truce till one or the other falls and gluts with blood

What are they here —violent, savage, lawless? or friendly to strangers, god-fearing men?

So now I meet my doom. Well let me die— but not without struggle, not without glory, no, in some great clash of arms that even men to come will hear of down the years!

So the immortals spun our lives that we, we wretched men live on to bear such torments-the gods live free of sorrows. There are two great jars that stand on the floor of Zeus's halls and hold his gifts, our miseries one, the other blessings. When Zeus who loves the lightning mixes gifts for a man, now he meets with misfortune, now good times in turn.

I respect and reverence you, dear father-in-law, I wish I had chosen death rather than following your son, leaving behind my bridal chamber, my beloved daughter, my dear childhood friends and my kin. But I did not, and I pine away in sorrow.

Sleep is sweet, whomever it seizes, though he has cares.

Human beings live for only a short time, and when a man is harsh himself, and his mind knows harsh thoughts, all men pray that sufferings will befall him hereafter while he lives; and when he is dead all men make fun of him. But when a man is blameless himself, and his thoughts are blameless, the friends he has entertained carry his fame widely to all mankind, and many are they who call him excellent.

la Musa excitó al aedo a que celebrase la gloria de los guerreros con un cantar cuya fama llegaba entonces al anchuroso cielo: la disputa de Odiseo y del Pelida Aquileo

But it gained us nothing —what good can come of grief?

güneÅŸin, y?ld?zl? göÄŸün alt?nda, yeryüzünde nice kentler var, bunlar içinde ben kutsal Ä°lyon'u severim Priamos'u Priamos'un iyi karg? atan halk?n?