Polytropus

Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of The Odyssey comes at just at the right time for me. I spent the last two years reading the Robert Fagles translation, finishing it just a few months ago. When I heard that Christopher Nolan was adapting Homer’s poem, I thought it made perfect sense. I really like the way that he plays around with flashbacks and narrative structure—something that The Odyssey is absolutely stuffed with. Meanwhile, inspired by Madeline Miller’s Circe, I’ve also been reading lots of modern retellings of Greek myths, including new takes on the events in The Odyssey. I’ve mentioned it before, but one of the most interesting choices in these interpretations is how to treat the gods in these stories. Do they actually exist, directing the narrative? Or are events told in a purely factual way? Claire North’s Songs of Penelope series has different gods narrate the story, but they themselves are non-interventionist. Likewise Pat Barker’s Trojan war trilogy is full of grit,…