Fran Middleton on Homer's Odyssey

cf. Part II paper A1 on Homer, Odyssey

This lecture will address the manner in which the Odyssey's poetry was transformed into a variety of material objects over the course of antiquity, primarily as a text edited for manuscript transmission in scrolls and (later) codices, but also as a text whose fragments could be used within 'magical' ritual and further poetic composition, through cento. Looking again at some key passages, we will discuss ways in which an awareness of the text's materialisation might affect interpretation of the poem, and therefore also the effect of its immaterial nature when delivered in oral performance.