The stories of the Trojan War, of Helen of Troy, Achilles’ heel, Jason and the Argonauts, and Odysseus’s quest are the building blocks of Western culture, yet how many readers know that they all spring from two sources —The Iliad and The Odyssey—and one blind poet, Homer? This exquisite analysis establishes how these two epic poems, written nearly three thousand years ago, have come to resonate throughout the world.

In this lyrical book Alberto Manguel traces with immense grace the lineage of these profoundly influential poems. Starting with their inception and considering their place in the greatest literature ever created, from the Rome of Virgil and Petrarch to Joyce’s Dublin via Dante and Racine, Manguel delights in the poems and celebrates their power and import throughout history.