We Followed Odysseus

by Hal Roth

The story of two legendary sailors - one from the ancient world, the other from today. Set against the backdrop of Homer's great tale, this is the story of sailing a small boat in the wake of Odysseus.

Genres: Nonfiction

225 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1999

Reviews

[Sasha · Rating 4 out of 5]

Four stars because I'd recommend it if, like me, you finished the Odyssey and immediately started fantasizing about retracing his voyage yourself. Otherwise, you can safely skip it.

A more philosophical writer might have connected his voyage with Odysseus's in a more personal or insightful way. And a more flowery writer might have evoked the scenes of Odysseus's trip, both then and now, more vividly. Roth is a sailing geek first, literature geek second, so an awful lot of this book is given over to describing how many sails he used on a given day or which anchor he put down.

But he gets the basic job done, and that's the important part. He successfully retraces anyone's best guess at Odysseus's route. His scholarship seems sound; he makes a worthy point of making it clear that this is all guesswork, and when his guess at a location differs from other valid guesses, he makes that clear as well.

And it's not like it's a huge time commitment anyway. At barely 200 pages of large type with loads of pictures, it's a day's reading. (And also: loads of pictures! Big bonus.)

I've recreated his map for the internet. Hope you don't mind, Hal. I totally gave you props for it.

[Leendert · Rating 3 out of 5]

interesting subject, so-so writing, affability of author notwithstanding