The prose translation, from which the passages of the "Odyssey" are taken, is better suited to present-day taste, trained by prose fiction rather than verse. It retains as far as has ever been done the Greek feeling and ideas, with all its richness of imagery and none of the affectation which we feel to-day in lengthy verse.
THE MAN AND THE AGE
1. Who was Homer?
2. What is the history of Troy?
3. What was the value of its geographical situation in those days? (Consult an atlas, classical, if possible.)
4. What was the character of social conditions in those days? See V, 432.
5. Apart from scientific progress, what distinctions can you make between this era and that of Homer?
6. The fall and sack of Troy is told by whom, in what epic? Explain why Homer did not deal with this dramatic episode.
STYLE AND WORKS