Bibliograph

An odyssey, a father, a son and an epic, Daniel Mendelsohn

Type

Label

An odyssey, a father, a son and an epic, Daniel Mendelsohn

Language

eng

resource.biographical

autobiography

Index

no index present

Literary Form

non fiction

Main title

An odyssey

Responsibility statement

Daniel Mendelsohn

Sub title

a father, a son and an epic

Summary

An Odyssey: A Father, a Son, and an Epic twines an ongoing reading of the most popular and beloved works of literature, Homer's Odyssey - with its irresistible tales of travel and adventure, and its eternal themes of transformed identities and climactic recognitions-around a personal journey of modern family life. This intimate narrative is a father-son story: an account of a year-long reading of the poem that Mendelsohn undertakes with his ailing father, first in the classroom, then on their travels around the Mediterranean in the footsteps of Odysseus. How the ancient tale effects its own unexpected recognitions and transformations in the relationship between father and son, and eventually, in the enduring questions that they faced once he fell ill and began to die, becomes a moving adventure of both the real and the metaphorical. Exploring the old poem, about long journeys and long marriages and long estrangements and about wanting to go home, An Odyssey illuminates some remarkable and unexpected similarities between the past of our forefathers and the present of our own fathers

Classification