HOMER - THE ODYSSEY
"Now, obviously, The Odyssey was not nearly as good as Rick Riordan's stuff, but it was still pretty good."
SHAKESPEARE - HAMLET
"Had to read for English Honors (yes, I am in 8th grade and taking 10th grade English, GET OVER IT) it was confusing and weird, Shakespeare, how you confuse me is beyond words, I bet if Yoda read this book he could decipher it, or better yet if Yoda wrote a book I would understand it better than this.... Oh well... I couldn't really understand the plot, but hey I got an A- and passed the class so IM SO DONE WITH THIS"
"Is it bad that I'm reading the No Fear version? Sounds like a cop-out, being an English teacher and all, but I just want to sit and read the story and enjoy it over the weekend without having to 'study' every speech for ten minutes like when I teach Macbeth or R & J. Oh well, sue me."
MACHIAVELLI - THE PRINCE
"Cheat to win is a philosophy that at times delegates how I play ultimate, teach, and get through the day."
"If we consider amoral politics to be the Hunger Games, Machiavelli has written a How-To manual for winning the game, desperately hoping that a Katniss will read his book and win on behalf of his district (Italy). Ultimately, his project is as objectionable as hers."
WOOLF - A ROOM OF ONE'S OWN
"Woolf's discussion about Aphra Behn, the fictional Shakesphere's sister is excellent."
MILTON - PARADISE LOST
"We had some fantastic discussion about Satan's character in Paradise Lost during my English class. I now only have a vision of him as this emo 15-year-old wearing a black t-shirt that says 'Humans = Death' (he, of course, rotates this shirt with his 'Satan is our king' hoodie)."
JOYCE - A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN
"Very soon, the book becomes a vehicle for astonishingly long-winded discourses on various issues better dealt with in a monograph; and midway then, Portrait ceases to be a novel or even a work of fiction really; as a diehard fan of literary fiction, having admired so many non-traditional novels, I have to say that this is an ugly book, with nary a human connection or relationship of warmth ... I'm a PhD candidate in English, and I'm deeply saddened by reading this. Portrait is an insult to the scores of wonderful novels from this past century that don't get the same recognition because they are not by James Joyce. Avoid if you can help it."
FREUD - THE INTERPRETATION OF DREAMS
"Dreams cannot be interpreted, they're random imagery. And Freudianism most definitely doesn't qualify as science. Anyone thinking otherwise is an utter idiot. And I absolutely hate it how every second film director has to put 'Freudian symbolism' in their works. I AM NOT INTERESTED IN LEARNING THEM GODDAMMIT. If your movie cannot be understood without knowing 'Freudian symbolism' then it's garbage, period."
KAFKA - THE CASTLE
"Okay, let me get my two cents in. As a lover of surrealism, a huge Kafka fan, and above all as a writer, I can vouch for this book. Was it bland? Yes. Was it dull and repetitive and even poorly written? I'd say so. Truth is, I didn't even read beyond Chapter 3. But this isn't a bad novel. We have to remember that this is a rough draft, a sketch if you will, of a novel left on the writer's desk. Hell, the draft wasn't even finished. Of course it's going to suck! Because it is unfinished. It is not published as the writer even intended it to be. Hell, Kafka didn't even want the bulk of his writing's to be published. I decided to stop reading this because to do so is disrespectful to the author."
NIETZSCHE - BEYOND GOOD AND EVIL
"His cause is further damaged by paragraphs containing no topic sentence and no resolution. Some paragraphs ramble on so long that even if there were a topic sentence, one would be hard pressed to remember it by the end."
SUETONIUS - THE TWELVE CAESARS
"A collection of the biographies of the twelve emperors of Ancient Greece from Julius Caesar to Domitian.
I found out that not all of emperors are great leaders. One of them is Caligula, a mentally deranged man. What he did is unbelievable. If he does not like his constituent is doing he want that person to suffer like being burned or tortured. He even engage in same sex relationship which is really shocking. I never thought homosexuality existed then already."
"I find it amazing that these alleged geniuses never seem to consider that perhaps Rome fell because the Romans were idiots who no longer took responsibility for their own actions. Accountability is something that isn't a foreign concept to the academics; it's something that is an alien thought process. And when I say alien, I don't mean a passive alien like ET."
SALINGER - THE CATCHER IN THE RYE
"I should not be rating this. It is my unrelieved pride in life that I have not read this book, that I will not read this book, that I, alone, utterly condemn this book as well as its author. Nor do I, have I ever, or will ever drive a car. I am unlicensed."
MELVILLE - MOBY-DICK
"HATED IT SO MUCH. As a person with a degree in literature, I feel quite guilty about this. Maybe need to try again. It did not help when the professor asked a question during our discussion of it and no one answered, so I offered my answer. Big mistake. For some reason that brought on ridicule and eventually the statement that 'ANY answer besides mine would be correct.' Which wasn't even true and quite harsh. I'd say not so conducive to the liberal arts learning method. Given how much we were paying, I should have told him what was what. But I was not nearly assertive enough in those days."
"HOW DARE YOU TELL ME I'M WRONG? DON'T YOU KNOW MY PARENTS ARE PAYING FOR THIS EDUCATION?" ~ TERRIBLE ENGLISH MAJOR #85002
SAPPHO - POEMS/FRAGMENTS
"It’s hard to like Sappho. I know, I know, I’m being horrible. She’s an early feminist icon and she was a great poet and all of that sort of thing, but we have only one poem of hers in complete form, and the rest of the fragments have been so deeply mined by other poets that its hard to see where she’s being original. Sure, the first time someone said that moonlight was like silver that was mindblowing stuff…and it may well have been her, but her metaphors are tired now, and her work is so fragmentary that I can’t see it as more than the leftover choppings of the Romantic poets."
HAWTHORNE - THE SCARLET LETTER
"It was very hard to read. I did enjoy the idea of being ostracized for the bad you did (is that wrong of me?)"
"I had to focus immensely on every detail ... ruining the fluidity of my mind slowly absorbing all the print.
Then class discussions were always about the symbolism within, why couldn't the letter be red because that's the fabric they had? Why is there symbolism with a meteor shower? Sounds like an asteroid belt got too close and the earth pulled in some stellar rocks- that's not too out of the normal.
I think teachers ruined this book by making my mind try to see things that it saw as mere coincidences or straight facts instead of hidden meanings."
Showing posts with label homer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label homer. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 18, 2013
Friday, March 15, 2013
Homer - The Odyssey V
"Boring. Not impressed."
"I don’t get it. It is literally one long ass poem. Hellpppp."
"I just had to read this for my lit class and it wasn't bad, but I felt like I was reading an older, less interesting adult version of Percy Jackson."
"The first part of the book lost me completely because it had nothing to do with Odysseus. I did not understand why in the world would they do that. In addition in the middle of the book they were talking about how his ship wrecked and how he was the only one left alive, that confused me even more. I think that it should have been put in a better chronological order. The Odyssey should have been told as a story, rather then being jumped around from one point of the story to the other."
"These Greek epithets are getting ridiculous. 'Hebe of the slim ankles'. Fucking come on."
"You know what I just realized
The Iliad and the Odyssey were basically religious fanfictions
And they got such a large following that it became canon
So basically
Homer is the founding father of fanfiction"
"This book is absolutely atrocious. Many literary geniuses would strongly disagree; but they're stupid and have never actually finished the book, NO ONE has ever finished it ever ever in the history of the world. This book sucks."
"Does it make me a bad English major if I don't particularly like The Odyssey?
At some level, I don't feel like I can honestly review a poem that's thousands of years old and far more important than me, but at the same time, I feel a little let down. After reading everything that alludes to it, I think the works that refers to The Odyssey are a lot better."
"Sexism? It was interesting to finally read the full book version, but I was pretty bored. I liked this story when I was little and didn't know any better. Now, well... Moving right along."
"I was expecting more sea monsters. Skip the book and watch the Wishbone version."
"All the values are so wrong! ... How silly! I liked the poem; and the world it transports you to; but I totally disliked the message and the values depicted there. No wonder why those are not ruling the world any more (if they ever did; which I doubt)"
"I don’t get it. It is literally one long ass poem. Hellpppp."
"I just had to read this for my lit class and it wasn't bad, but I felt like I was reading an older, less interesting adult version of Percy Jackson."
"The first part of the book lost me completely because it had nothing to do with Odysseus. I did not understand why in the world would they do that. In addition in the middle of the book they were talking about how his ship wrecked and how he was the only one left alive, that confused me even more. I think that it should have been put in a better chronological order. The Odyssey should have been told as a story, rather then being jumped around from one point of the story to the other."
"These Greek epithets are getting ridiculous. 'Hebe of the slim ankles'. Fucking come on."
"You know what I just realized
The Iliad and the Odyssey were basically religious fanfictions
And they got such a large following that it became canon
So basically
Homer is the founding father of fanfiction"
"This book is absolutely atrocious. Many literary geniuses would strongly disagree; but they're stupid and have never actually finished the book, NO ONE has ever finished it ever ever in the history of the world. This book sucks."
"Does it make me a bad English major if I don't particularly like The Odyssey?
At some level, I don't feel like I can honestly review a poem that's thousands of years old and far more important than me, but at the same time, I feel a little let down. After reading everything that alludes to it, I think the works that refers to The Odyssey are a lot better."
"Sexism? It was interesting to finally read the full book version, but I was pretty bored. I liked this story when I was little and didn't know any better. Now, well... Moving right along."
"I was expecting more sea monsters. Skip the book and watch the Wishbone version."
"All the values are so wrong! ... How silly! I liked the poem; and the world it transports you to; but I totally disliked the message and the values depicted there. No wonder why those are not ruling the world any more (if they ever did; which I doubt)"
Saturday, February 23, 2013
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Homer - The Odyssey IV
"I have two degrees in English and have never read The Odyssey cover to cover"
"It is a great story! I am a giant fan of mythology and this is quite an epic. This follows Oedipus's journey through the seas and to multiple mythical islands. It is fantastic!"
"This book was about a man named Odysseus who led a crew of men after the victory of the Trojan War. He encounters many different creatures such as the cyclops, and the witch. He fought them bravely and tried to save his crew. But the one journey that he couldn't prevail to defeat the monsters in the Land of the Dead. Odysseus had barely managed to escape in the end saving no one but himself from the Land of the Dead."
"Boring, full of nonsense, stupid, annoying, and just unrealistic! All the characters are selfish. Telemachus and Penelope are huge wimps, Suitors are stupid antagonists, Calypso is unrealistically dumb, Odysseus is senseless, the Gods have no motivation for ANYTHING they do, Athena randomly beautifies people for no reason whatsoever, Poseidon's a pathetic bastard, Gods are self-centered beings that require praying and sacrifice every second if someone was to go on an adventure. SELFISH SELFISH SELFISH! I really hate this book, I can't believe I had to read it for school. Why in the world does anyone think it's any good???"
"a book for which you need a translator / interpreter only to find out how booooring it is."
"This is the oldest story we have as a race, and it has got to be the first and oldest Mary Sue. So....Odysseus is gone ten years battling at Troy and FINALLY the war ends but it takes him another ten years to get back. He is 'brave and heroic' but really came across as a braggart and d-bag. He EXPECTS people to offer him hospitality and offer him presents, he is a CONSTANT liar. Even when he gets home, he lies about who he is to Minerva until he realizes who she is. (Never trust a man that can lie so easy.)
...
The icing on the cake, though, is the fact that he finally wants to get home because he misses his land and belongings. Not because he misses his wife and son. Wow. When he goes to Hades and speaks to the dead, his questions are all about wether his wife is true to him and taking care of his property and if his son is still holding his belongings.
Could a man be more self-centered? Why do we revere and praise this guy as a hero? The ONLY reason this book gets any star, is because I love Greek mythology. I thought, like with other classics I'm reading or re-reading as an adult, maybe I can interpret it differently and appreciate it better, whereas I might not have as a teen. Nope. Book sucks. I don't care if it is a classic and the oldest recorded story of man. It is a Mary-sue of wishful thinking and just as I would harshly judge a contemporary piece that replaces good story with fluff, I gladly shuffle this book back under my coffee table, hoping it does a better job of keeping my drinks from sliding to the floor, than it did at entertaining me."
"The Odyssey by Homer is a collection of 24 short 'books' of poems. I started reading it about two months ago, and I find it, unfortunately, very difficult to comprehend, as you might easily with Harry Potter or The Hunger Games."
"Even as an English major I don't think I will ever be mature enough to enjoy or understand this book."
"It is a great story! I am a giant fan of mythology and this is quite an epic. This follows Oedipus's journey through the seas and to multiple mythical islands. It is fantastic!"
"This book was about a man named Odysseus who led a crew of men after the victory of the Trojan War. He encounters many different creatures such as the cyclops, and the witch. He fought them bravely and tried to save his crew. But the one journey that he couldn't prevail to defeat the monsters in the Land of the Dead. Odysseus had barely managed to escape in the end saving no one but himself from the Land of the Dead."
"Boring, full of nonsense, stupid, annoying, and just unrealistic! All the characters are selfish. Telemachus and Penelope are huge wimps, Suitors are stupid antagonists, Calypso is unrealistically dumb, Odysseus is senseless, the Gods have no motivation for ANYTHING they do, Athena randomly beautifies people for no reason whatsoever, Poseidon's a pathetic bastard, Gods are self-centered beings that require praying and sacrifice every second if someone was to go on an adventure. SELFISH SELFISH SELFISH! I really hate this book, I can't believe I had to read it for school. Why in the world does anyone think it's any good???"
"a book for which you need a translator / interpreter only to find out how booooring it is."
"This is the oldest story we have as a race, and it has got to be the first and oldest Mary Sue. So....Odysseus is gone ten years battling at Troy and FINALLY the war ends but it takes him another ten years to get back. He is 'brave and heroic' but really came across as a braggart and d-bag. He EXPECTS people to offer him hospitality and offer him presents, he is a CONSTANT liar. Even when he gets home, he lies about who he is to Minerva until he realizes who she is. (Never trust a man that can lie so easy.)
...
The icing on the cake, though, is the fact that he finally wants to get home because he misses his land and belongings. Not because he misses his wife and son. Wow. When he goes to Hades and speaks to the dead, his questions are all about wether his wife is true to him and taking care of his property and if his son is still holding his belongings.
Could a man be more self-centered? Why do we revere and praise this guy as a hero? The ONLY reason this book gets any star, is because I love Greek mythology. I thought, like with other classics I'm reading or re-reading as an adult, maybe I can interpret it differently and appreciate it better, whereas I might not have as a teen. Nope. Book sucks. I don't care if it is a classic and the oldest recorded story of man. It is a Mary-sue of wishful thinking and just as I would harshly judge a contemporary piece that replaces good story with fluff, I gladly shuffle this book back under my coffee table, hoping it does a better job of keeping my drinks from sliding to the floor, than it did at entertaining me."
"The Odyssey by Homer is a collection of 24 short 'books' of poems. I started reading it about two months ago, and I find it, unfortunately, very difficult to comprehend, as you might easily with Harry Potter or The Hunger Games."
"Even as an English major I don't think I will ever be mature enough to enjoy or understand this book."
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Homer - The Iliad III
"I have a dog and a family. I'm a liberal. I hate The Iliad, ignorant people and anyone who gets pleasure out of reality television."
"There was too much violence for me. Really? Did he have to kill everyone at the end?"
"Since I loved the movie Troy, I thought I would love The Iliad, which provides the basis of the plot in the movie. However, I was sorely disappointed when I discovered that although The Iliad is very similar to Troy, it is very dull. Basically, the movie is all action and drama while the book is just literally boring description after boring description of battle. It is very repetitive, and there are literally hundreds of characters in this poem. In fact, many characters have multiple names, as do the armies. In short, although the movie changes/leaves out some things in the book, it is actually a lot better than the poem itself. Therefore, while I give the movie a 5 star rating, I only give the book a 2 star rating."
"It's not the style of contemporary book people is habituated to read ... The history is full of confuse facts that are related in such a extensively descriptive way that does not help to its easy understanding. Some of the characters have very similar names between themselves and aren't blood related.
As a common factor of the age in which this book was written we should add like another bad aspect too, the fact the characters always have the same descriptions by the side (eg. silver feet for Iris , fast feet, for Hector and Achilles, owl's eyes for Hera) and are repeated in the most extreme ways."
"I read (and comprehended) the entire poem in Latin. #BAWSE"
A MEAN FEAT
"I HATE THE ILIAD. WISH SOMEONE WOULD WRITE THIS PAPER FOR ME. I DON’T EVEN KNOW WHO HECTOR AND ACHILLES ARE! SMH."
"Culturally and historically, it's a work of major importance and I totally get that, but reading it made my brain hurt. There's no consistent narrative, the characters are all over the place, scenes of great power and scope are intercut with sequences of ridiculous actions and motivations, and let's not get started on the gods constantly swooping in and out of things (and I'd also mention that it has no beginning or end, but that's not its fault as it's the only surviving volume of a larger saga). I know, I know, it's an ancient work and shouldn't be held to modern standards"
"I hate The Iliad. I hate it. I loathe it. I want it to stop. Paris is stupid. Everyone is stupid. Hate."
"I hate the Iliad. Stupid Homer...why'd ya have to go and write it??"
"I hate the Iliad and the Odyssey, the two canons of American high school and college literature courses - their two examples of ancient, persevering, set-in-stone literature with times that span the tests of time and space. And I hate them. I wonder if this is one of the reasons I wasn't meant to be an English major. I can't agree with the canon... the Core, as Columbia puts it. I'm pretty sure that the Western-centric Core includes the Iliad and the Odyssey"
"reading it I felt like Homer should have had his tongue cut out as well."
"There was too much violence for me. Really? Did he have to kill everyone at the end?"
"Since I loved the movie Troy, I thought I would love The Iliad, which provides the basis of the plot in the movie. However, I was sorely disappointed when I discovered that although The Iliad is very similar to Troy, it is very dull. Basically, the movie is all action and drama while the book is just literally boring description after boring description of battle. It is very repetitive, and there are literally hundreds of characters in this poem. In fact, many characters have multiple names, as do the armies. In short, although the movie changes/leaves out some things in the book, it is actually a lot better than the poem itself. Therefore, while I give the movie a 5 star rating, I only give the book a 2 star rating."
"It's not the style of contemporary book people is habituated to read ... The history is full of confuse facts that are related in such a extensively descriptive way that does not help to its easy understanding. Some of the characters have very similar names between themselves and aren't blood related.
As a common factor of the age in which this book was written we should add like another bad aspect too, the fact the characters always have the same descriptions by the side (eg. silver feet for Iris , fast feet, for Hector and Achilles, owl's eyes for Hera) and are repeated in the most extreme ways."
"I read (and comprehended) the entire poem in Latin. #BAWSE"
A MEAN FEAT
"I HATE THE ILIAD. WISH SOMEONE WOULD WRITE THIS PAPER FOR ME. I DON’T EVEN KNOW WHO HECTOR AND ACHILLES ARE! SMH."
"Culturally and historically, it's a work of major importance and I totally get that, but reading it made my brain hurt. There's no consistent narrative, the characters are all over the place, scenes of great power and scope are intercut with sequences of ridiculous actions and motivations, and let's not get started on the gods constantly swooping in and out of things (and I'd also mention that it has no beginning or end, but that's not its fault as it's the only surviving volume of a larger saga). I know, I know, it's an ancient work and shouldn't be held to modern standards"
"I hate The Iliad. I hate it. I loathe it. I want it to stop. Paris is stupid. Everyone is stupid. Hate."
"I hate the Iliad. Stupid Homer...why'd ya have to go and write it??"
"I hate the Iliad and the Odyssey, the two canons of American high school and college literature courses - their two examples of ancient, persevering, set-in-stone literature with times that span the tests of time and space. And I hate them. I wonder if this is one of the reasons I wasn't meant to be an English major. I can't agree with the canon... the Core, as Columbia puts it. I'm pretty sure that the Western-centric Core includes the Iliad and the Odyssey"
"reading it I felt like Homer should have had his tongue cut out as well."
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Homer - The Odyssey III
"Yet another book assigned to ninth graders that I don't think they will be able to relate to. I've been assigned The Odyssey numerous times and have never been able to read it cover to cover. Maybe this is my year..."
"When I first read this book, I thought that I would never be able to finish this book because there was a lot of reading I had to do."
"you would think that a huge fantasy nerd like me would have loved this book."
"Sure the killing and the monsters and the adultery is all swell, especially when read as a 13 year old. Still an overlong tale (epics are definitively but unnecessarily so) only bested by Ovid's Aeneid for tedious filler material."
"My goodness, was this a boring book or what? This was one of the worst books I've ever read. I mean, I get that it's a classic and everybody should like it and all of that other pretense, but I did not enjoy one bit of this book, I'm sorry to say."
"so so so soooooooo boring oh my goodness i wanted to cry"
"the odyssey was just really confusing, and it was like not fun to read!"
"WELL I DIDNT LIKE THIS BOOK VERY MUCH IT WAS BORING AND NOT MY TASTE. I RECOMENED THIS BOOK TO PEOPLE WHO LIKE GREEK THINGS OR THINGS LIKE THAT."
"I was very disappoionted about the story. Getting very good reviews and feedbac; it wasent very interesting.It started off boring and finished off the same"
"I found Odysseus very arrogant and the gods hypocritical and the actions of them morally questionable. The style was also patronizing in places, by always addressing characters with an adjective describing their character, which we should make our own minds about, and not be force fed what we should think of them."
"When I first read this book, I thought that I would never be able to finish this book because there was a lot of reading I had to do."
"you would think that a huge fantasy nerd like me would have loved this book."
"Sure the killing and the monsters and the adultery is all swell, especially when read as a 13 year old. Still an overlong tale (epics are definitively but unnecessarily so) only bested by Ovid's Aeneid for tedious filler material."
"My goodness, was this a boring book or what? This was one of the worst books I've ever read. I mean, I get that it's a classic and everybody should like it and all of that other pretense, but I did not enjoy one bit of this book, I'm sorry to say."
"so so so soooooooo boring oh my goodness i wanted to cry"
"the odyssey was just really confusing, and it was like not fun to read!"
"WELL I DIDNT LIKE THIS BOOK VERY MUCH IT WAS BORING AND NOT MY TASTE. I RECOMENED THIS BOOK TO PEOPLE WHO LIKE GREEK THINGS OR THINGS LIKE THAT."
"I was very disappoionted about the story. Getting very good reviews and feedbac; it wasent very interesting.It started off boring and finished off the same"
"I found Odysseus very arrogant and the gods hypocritical and the actions of them morally questionable. The style was also patronizing in places, by always addressing characters with an adjective describing their character, which we should make our own minds about, and not be force fed what we should think of them."
Thursday, August 18, 2011
Homer - The Odyssey II
"this is an absolute waste of time."
"It had been a long war, everyone agreed.
But at last Odysseus, king of Ithaca, hero of the Trojan War, loving husband and father, was finally heading home across the Aegean.
...Perhaps, in retrospect, not the best time to kill the son of Poseidon, Greek good of the sea, but really, it couldn't be helped.
Now it's one mortal man against every monster, witch and elemental god this side of Byzantium, in a race to reach home beore his wife marries one of the suitors slumming in his banquet hall."
"this was the most boring book i have ever read i dont even get it!!!!!"
"so old its almost part of history."
"The Odyssey is a book I will never read again if I don't have to. The storyline was too far-fetched for my imagine in order to comprehend the novel."
"What would you do if you did not know whether your husband was dead or alive? Would you remarry and move on? That was a big decision that Odyssey’s wife had to make. She had to make this decision not knowing if her beloved husband would return from the war against Troy. The Odyssey takes you on a heroic journey with Odyssey himself, as he tries to get back to his Kingdom named Ithaca.
...
The author made the story seem unbelievable by writing the places that Odyssey visited, unrealistic. He described places with such detail that I didn’t believe it myself. He made the characters unrealistic as well. He talked about a Cyclops named Polyphemus, who was tricked by Odyssey. The way Homer described Calypso (the sea goddess) was very vivid."
"I had to read the whole thing for school. If I was reading it on my own I probably would have stopped a third of the way through. It was boring and there was no real depth to Odysseus. When it came down to it, it was just a guy desperate to get to his home in Ithaca. Probably one of the most tiring books I've read."
"There's nothing. Can't relate to the story."
"man who goes through a hold lo of advanture just to make it home and when he get home he still got promblems.on his journey home he faces the cyclops the siren chydris and carbdis plus the suitors"
"omg...I started 30 years ago and haven't finished it yet"
"Interesting enough to read, boring enough to regret it."
"Confusing as hell. There's a ton of characters and it's hard to keep everything straight. Homer gets points for writing the entire thing in verse, but I didn't enjoy the tale."
"I'm thinking about teaching it to my sophomores this year. It's another monumental work, but ploddingly dull. Great stories interspersed among mind numbing concentration on events that seemed totally trivial to me. Maybe I don't have the correct perspective, but I decided if I do teach it I'll only do excerpts. A few lines about seven years of enslavement with Calypso, with whom in other stories he has an illegitimate child, then pages and pages narrating him hanging out with his shepherd before confronting the suitors. It's bad balance."
"My least favorite character is the Cyclops, because he was a huge distraction on their mission. The Cyclops ate most of the characters and I did not like the setting of where they were."
"I love a lot of the classics in movie form, but as for trying to get through them in book form the writing is boring."
"I hope my students never read this."
"It had been a long war, everyone agreed.
But at last Odysseus, king of Ithaca, hero of the Trojan War, loving husband and father, was finally heading home across the Aegean.
...Perhaps, in retrospect, not the best time to kill the son of Poseidon, Greek good of the sea, but really, it couldn't be helped.
Now it's one mortal man against every monster, witch and elemental god this side of Byzantium, in a race to reach home beore his wife marries one of the suitors slumming in his banquet hall."
"this was the most boring book i have ever read i dont even get it!!!!!"
"so old its almost part of history."
"The Odyssey is a book I will never read again if I don't have to. The storyline was too far-fetched for my imagine in order to comprehend the novel."
"What would you do if you did not know whether your husband was dead or alive? Would you remarry and move on? That was a big decision that Odyssey’s wife had to make. She had to make this decision not knowing if her beloved husband would return from the war against Troy. The Odyssey takes you on a heroic journey with Odyssey himself, as he tries to get back to his Kingdom named Ithaca.
...
The author made the story seem unbelievable by writing the places that Odyssey visited, unrealistic. He described places with such detail that I didn’t believe it myself. He made the characters unrealistic as well. He talked about a Cyclops named Polyphemus, who was tricked by Odyssey. The way Homer described Calypso (the sea goddess) was very vivid."
"I had to read the whole thing for school. If I was reading it on my own I probably would have stopped a third of the way through. It was boring and there was no real depth to Odysseus. When it came down to it, it was just a guy desperate to get to his home in Ithaca. Probably one of the most tiring books I've read."
"There's nothing. Can't relate to the story."
"man who goes through a hold lo of advanture just to make it home and when he get home he still got promblems.on his journey home he faces the cyclops the siren chydris and carbdis plus the suitors"
"omg...I started 30 years ago and haven't finished it yet"
"Interesting enough to read, boring enough to regret it."
"Confusing as hell. There's a ton of characters and it's hard to keep everything straight. Homer gets points for writing the entire thing in verse, but I didn't enjoy the tale."
"I'm thinking about teaching it to my sophomores this year. It's another monumental work, but ploddingly dull. Great stories interspersed among mind numbing concentration on events that seemed totally trivial to me. Maybe I don't have the correct perspective, but I decided if I do teach it I'll only do excerpts. A few lines about seven years of enslavement with Calypso, with whom in other stories he has an illegitimate child, then pages and pages narrating him hanging out with his shepherd before confronting the suitors. It's bad balance."
"My least favorite character is the Cyclops, because he was a huge distraction on their mission. The Cyclops ate most of the characters and I did not like the setting of where they were."
"I love a lot of the classics in movie form, but as for trying to get through them in book form the writing is boring."
"I hope my students never read this."
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Homer - The Iliad II
"Too many words"
"Seriously. Homer wasn't all that, and I'm so thankful to Amazon.com to allow me to give it only two stars.
Homer's boring, and he's totally overrated. He's always using the same lines- 'bit the dust', 'rosy-fingered dawn', 'the wine-dark sea', 'night filled his eyes', 'Achilles swift of foot'- Homer needs to be more original. And what's with the one name- 'Homer'- who does he think he is, Madonna?"
"u know the iliad sucks. i hate it. its stupid. its toooo long. the plot just gets boring. it just runs on"
"All the zombies kept telling me to purchase the Iliad and were raving about how intellectual it was. The age of it should have been a first clue. Really a rather boring read that is tripe with inept ideals. Homer Simpson was named after this guy but I believe that he has more insight into the subject matter than the original home boy they call Homer. Good for using to set your coffee mug on and start a fire with in the fireplace, but beyond that it is really a lot of rubbish. I wish Penguin Classics would actually publish classic reading material instead of a lot of blah blah."
"The ruse of the Trojan horse continues even today in the electronic world. While containing many heroes, this probably the first literature to document that 'persistance pays off.'"
"All I can remember since it was so long is that it is roman."
"This was a terrible time with so much blood shed, and so much pain for both sides. Achilles when he died I was sad. But in the end the side I was on won. Troy was destroyed just the way me and Athena planed. They did and excellent job. Homer captured this story as if he was actually there but he was not and I saw it all for myself and planed it all. Like a well played game of chest."
"It was very interesting if you like mythotical creatures..."
"I did not the whole book, but from what I read, nothing made sense, and nothing was entertaining."
"This book does not even deserve stars. I understand it is a classic, but what is the deal with being unable to decipher books from 1600 BC? No sentences actually make sense! I urge anyone thats thinks of reading this book to consider ripping it up instead. I spent an hour reading ten pages and then I thought, 'wow what did I just read?'"
"No Trojan Horse???"
"Before Tolkein there were many epics, this is one of the earliest."
"I found the character development a little wanting, the deities especially seemed somewhat unidinmensional and 'larger than life.' I also thought the author had difficulty connecting with a modern audience. As for plot development, I found myself wondering what happened to a lot of the surviving characters, like, for instance, Odysseus."
"There were far too many battles for my taste. It's just not that interesting to me."
"The Iliad. The longest piece of crap I've ever read. Not a single character arouses the slightest bit of sympathy or emotion, besides frustration. I kind of liked Hector ... In Chapter 16, he kills Patroclus. Big deal. It's a war. But then 'man-killing Hector' (What is he, a hitokiri? That's basically what 'hitokiri' means. Hmm, maybe Hec was Shishio in a later life…) decides that Patroclus' body should feed the dogs of Troy. I didn't like Patroclus; he puts on Achilles armor to rally the troops, but he pushes it. I did NOT need a three-page description of everyone Patroclus killed while wearing Achilles' shining armor.
...
If Homer really did write this, he wouldn't have been able to get this crap published if he paid for it himself!"
"I've read and loved all of the classics: Little Women, The Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men, Tale of Two Cities, Julius Caesar, Hamlet, Iliad."
YEP, THAT'S THE LOT. CONGRATULATIONS
"Seriously. Homer wasn't all that, and I'm so thankful to Amazon.com to allow me to give it only two stars.
Homer's boring, and he's totally overrated. He's always using the same lines- 'bit the dust', 'rosy-fingered dawn', 'the wine-dark sea', 'night filled his eyes', 'Achilles swift of foot'- Homer needs to be more original. And what's with the one name- 'Homer'- who does he think he is, Madonna?"
"u know the iliad sucks. i hate it. its stupid. its toooo long. the plot just gets boring. it just runs on"
"All the zombies kept telling me to purchase the Iliad and were raving about how intellectual it was. The age of it should have been a first clue. Really a rather boring read that is tripe with inept ideals. Homer Simpson was named after this guy but I believe that he has more insight into the subject matter than the original home boy they call Homer. Good for using to set your coffee mug on and start a fire with in the fireplace, but beyond that it is really a lot of rubbish. I wish Penguin Classics would actually publish classic reading material instead of a lot of blah blah."
"The ruse of the Trojan horse continues even today in the electronic world. While containing many heroes, this probably the first literature to document that 'persistance pays off.'"
"All I can remember since it was so long is that it is roman."
"This was a terrible time with so much blood shed, and so much pain for both sides. Achilles when he died I was sad. But in the end the side I was on won. Troy was destroyed just the way me and Athena planed. They did and excellent job. Homer captured this story as if he was actually there but he was not and I saw it all for myself and planed it all. Like a well played game of chest."
"It was very interesting if you like mythotical creatures..."
"I did not the whole book, but from what I read, nothing made sense, and nothing was entertaining."
"This book does not even deserve stars. I understand it is a classic, but what is the deal with being unable to decipher books from 1600 BC? No sentences actually make sense! I urge anyone thats thinks of reading this book to consider ripping it up instead. I spent an hour reading ten pages and then I thought, 'wow what did I just read?'"
"No Trojan Horse???"
"Before Tolkein there were many epics, this is one of the earliest."
"I found the character development a little wanting, the deities especially seemed somewhat unidinmensional and 'larger than life.' I also thought the author had difficulty connecting with a modern audience. As for plot development, I found myself wondering what happened to a lot of the surviving characters, like, for instance, Odysseus."
"There were far too many battles for my taste. It's just not that interesting to me."
"The Iliad. The longest piece of crap I've ever read. Not a single character arouses the slightest bit of sympathy or emotion, besides frustration. I kind of liked Hector ... In Chapter 16, he kills Patroclus. Big deal. It's a war. But then 'man-killing Hector' (What is he, a hitokiri? That's basically what 'hitokiri' means. Hmm, maybe Hec was Shishio in a later life…) decides that Patroclus' body should feed the dogs of Troy. I didn't like Patroclus; he puts on Achilles armor to rally the troops, but he pushes it. I did NOT need a three-page description of everyone Patroclus killed while wearing Achilles' shining armor.
...
If Homer really did write this, he wouldn't have been able to get this crap published if he paid for it himself!"
"I've read and loved all of the classics: Little Women, The Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men, Tale of Two Cities, Julius Caesar, Hamlet, Iliad."
YEP, THAT'S THE LOT. CONGRATULATIONS
Homer - The Iliad
"Maybe I'm being a bit critical on the first novel in history, but I found it 'repetitive, long and Hellish. No fun; excessive words'"
"Okay, so I'm aware that this is a widely beloved book with it's Homers, and it's oral tellings, and it's histories-DAAAWHAWWW
But it must be said. This book makes a habit of taking FOR-FREAKING-EVER to explain what could be said in like five seconds. Example? Heres one:
A bunch of freaking ships sail to troy!
There I've done it. I have finally taken the biggest dumb on Homer. For in the book, that sentence takes AN ENTIRE CHAPTER TO SAY!!! You could argue that it's poetry. And since I almost never go out of my way to read poetry AND I think Shakespeare is REALLY over rated, that point would at all be unjustified. You could also say that Homer was explaining all of the ships and who was on it. EXCEPT THAT NOBODY WOULD EVER GIVE A CRAP IF THIS BOOK WASN'T SO FRIGGIN' OLD!!!
Finally, you could argue that since I didn't finish the book, I have no right to criticize it. But, OOOH NO! I would sort of begin to agree with you If I was criticizing the plot or the continuity, and so on. But, I'm complaining about something that cannot be ignored. You can turn to any page in the story and see this problem. That is, the over stating of a simple idea. Many books fall for this. Even "Pendragon," one of my favorite franchises is guilty of doing this. Even I! Why just read this review and you'll see it!!! In fact, that's basically what writing is! One of the major goals of a writer is to create the illusion that there isn't any rambling going on, and this book fails on ALL accounts.
Oh man, I'm getting so worked up about this that I'm overusing the caps lock. Well, I think my point is made. I didn't like 'The Illiad.'"
"The ending was sucky! I mean it's a war story for pete's sake! And all that happened was that Priam went and begged Achilles for Hector's body, Achilles gave it to him and they buried Hector. I we didn't get to see the fall of Troy, the fall of Achilles or the Trojan horse (I really thought that I would see the Trojan horse. I mean this is the TROJAN war!). LAME!!"
"I thought I would like it since I just finished Percy Jackson and was digging the greek mythology and I love the movie Troy."
"The translation by Rouse while less poetic is more prosaic and a better read as much of the repetitious poem is edited out."
"I kept waiting for the Trojan horse to show up! Everybody has heard of the Trojan horse, so why isn't it in The Iliad? Now I know that The Iliad is about the anger of Achilles. But Achilles' heel and death do not occur in The Iliad either. There were probably many other ancient Greek epics that have been lost and are no longer known to us today. I think The Iliad was preserved because it was so uninteresting that later authors weren't tempted to rewrite it with later versions. That explains why the myths of the Trojan horse and Achilles' heel are based on later writings. They are more interesting plot ideas and may have preempted earlier myths that are now lost. (This is my idea and I may be the only person who believes it.
...
Why is the concept of avoiding death by not fighting so hard to understand? These guys think they're fated to die in battle. Why not rob (or delay) the fate of death and run the other direction?"
"I didn't really care for the Illiad, at least not the way I liked the Oddessy or even the Aneid."
"never like dungeons and dragons, thus didn't care for this one either."
"Supprisingly, there is no wooden horse ... In fact, Achilles doesn't even die in this edition. No, the book ends with Hector's funeral, and the ending is hasty."
"OK, I know I make myself look like a cretin when I give two stars to a foundational work in Western literature, but what can I say? Maybe I'm a dolt. I found this epic poem really LONG
...
I'm still bothered by a religiosity that appears to be obviously false. What do I mean by that? Say you are sitting there listening to this poem and they are talking about gods just popping up and acting in history, tangibly and observably; wouldn't you wonder what gives?
...
Obviously I know nothing about BC Greece, but they actually had athletic competitions at a funeral? Does it bother anyone else that between killing Hector and the famous scene with Priam at the end Achilles and his buddies stop to have wrestling matches and chariot races on the beech? Truly bizarre."
"This book was long. Not as long as some other books, but it felt longgg ... It didn't even cover the Trojan horse- really?"
"I'm almost positive this is the first novel I've ever read."
"more blood and guts than I would have thought possible in so old of a book."
"This was the first book I read in worldview and I really didn't like it. One of the reasons may be because it's for school. But the likely reason is because I am female. The book is a description of the war between the Trojans and the Greeks. The majority of it is descriptions of guts, brains, innards, and bones being smashed and strewn over the battlefield. There is not much of a plot and what little plot there is gets wiped away by the extreme graphic violence. So really it's a guys book and probably will not be enjoyed be normal girls."
"I can't believe I'm saying this ... but ...
The movie was better. Yeah, that Troy one with Brad Pitt. I'm intelligent, but"
NO I THINK YOU CAN STOP RIGHT ABOUT THERE
"Modernity has simply rendered some books irrelevant."
"Okay, so I'm aware that this is a widely beloved book with it's Homers, and it's oral tellings, and it's histories-DAAAWHAWWW
But it must be said. This book makes a habit of taking FOR-FREAKING-EVER to explain what could be said in like five seconds. Example? Heres one:
A bunch of freaking ships sail to troy!
There I've done it. I have finally taken the biggest dumb on Homer. For in the book, that sentence takes AN ENTIRE CHAPTER TO SAY!!! You could argue that it's poetry. And since I almost never go out of my way to read poetry AND I think Shakespeare is REALLY over rated, that point would at all be unjustified. You could also say that Homer was explaining all of the ships and who was on it. EXCEPT THAT NOBODY WOULD EVER GIVE A CRAP IF THIS BOOK WASN'T SO FRIGGIN' OLD!!!
Finally, you could argue that since I didn't finish the book, I have no right to criticize it. But, OOOH NO! I would sort of begin to agree with you If I was criticizing the plot or the continuity, and so on. But, I'm complaining about something that cannot be ignored. You can turn to any page in the story and see this problem. That is, the over stating of a simple idea. Many books fall for this. Even "Pendragon," one of my favorite franchises is guilty of doing this. Even I! Why just read this review and you'll see it!!! In fact, that's basically what writing is! One of the major goals of a writer is to create the illusion that there isn't any rambling going on, and this book fails on ALL accounts.
Oh man, I'm getting so worked up about this that I'm overusing the caps lock. Well, I think my point is made. I didn't like 'The Illiad.'"
"The ending was sucky! I mean it's a war story for pete's sake! And all that happened was that Priam went and begged Achilles for Hector's body, Achilles gave it to him and they buried Hector. I we didn't get to see the fall of Troy, the fall of Achilles or the Trojan horse (I really thought that I would see the Trojan horse. I mean this is the TROJAN war!). LAME!!"
"I thought I would like it since I just finished Percy Jackson and was digging the greek mythology and I love the movie Troy."
"The translation by Rouse while less poetic is more prosaic and a better read as much of the repetitious poem is edited out."
"I kept waiting for the Trojan horse to show up! Everybody has heard of the Trojan horse, so why isn't it in The Iliad? Now I know that The Iliad is about the anger of Achilles. But Achilles' heel and death do not occur in The Iliad either. There were probably many other ancient Greek epics that have been lost and are no longer known to us today. I think The Iliad was preserved because it was so uninteresting that later authors weren't tempted to rewrite it with later versions. That explains why the myths of the Trojan horse and Achilles' heel are based on later writings. They are more interesting plot ideas and may have preempted earlier myths that are now lost. (This is my idea and I may be the only person who believes it.
...
Why is the concept of avoiding death by not fighting so hard to understand? These guys think they're fated to die in battle. Why not rob (or delay) the fate of death and run the other direction?"
"I didn't really care for the Illiad, at least not the way I liked the Oddessy or even the Aneid."
"never like dungeons and dragons, thus didn't care for this one either."
"Supprisingly, there is no wooden horse ... In fact, Achilles doesn't even die in this edition. No, the book ends with Hector's funeral, and the ending is hasty."
"OK, I know I make myself look like a cretin when I give two stars to a foundational work in Western literature, but what can I say? Maybe I'm a dolt. I found this epic poem really LONG
...
I'm still bothered by a religiosity that appears to be obviously false. What do I mean by that? Say you are sitting there listening to this poem and they are talking about gods just popping up and acting in history, tangibly and observably; wouldn't you wonder what gives?
...
Obviously I know nothing about BC Greece, but they actually had athletic competitions at a funeral? Does it bother anyone else that between killing Hector and the famous scene with Priam at the end Achilles and his buddies stop to have wrestling matches and chariot races on the beech? Truly bizarre."
"This book was long. Not as long as some other books, but it felt longgg ... It didn't even cover the Trojan horse- really?"
"I'm almost positive this is the first novel I've ever read."
"more blood and guts than I would have thought possible in so old of a book."
"This was the first book I read in worldview and I really didn't like it. One of the reasons may be because it's for school. But the likely reason is because I am female. The book is a description of the war between the Trojans and the Greeks. The majority of it is descriptions of guts, brains, innards, and bones being smashed and strewn over the battlefield. There is not much of a plot and what little plot there is gets wiped away by the extreme graphic violence. So really it's a guys book and probably will not be enjoyed be normal girls."
"I can't believe I'm saying this ... but ...
The movie was better. Yeah, that Troy one with Brad Pitt. I'm intelligent, but"
NO I THINK YOU CAN STOP RIGHT ABOUT THERE
"Modernity has simply rendered some books irrelevant."
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Homer - The Odyssey
"I didn't read the glossary, if you did I recommend going on one of those widely-successful sites like eHarmony.com.
I would never have read this if my crazy teacher hadn't said, 'Please hand in your books tomorrow morning so i can grade them and return them. Yes, I blame you Mr. L. He actually seems to like this book......Elevated speech or whatever is stupid--it just wastes space. Instead of saying, 'Oh, greetings to you, Nestor the Gerenian horseman. What brings you to my fine land. Who fair thee? Is your wife well or has she left you for another lesser man?' can't we just say, 'S'up?'"
"Odysseus and his men had to go on a journey, for some odd reason"
"But then again, it's supposed to be in Greek and it was written way back when people didn't know better, so ya can't blame poor Homer."
"Accoording to what i know about Odysseus i believe that he should not be in the Hero Hall of Fame Nomination Committee. He killed innocent people , cheated on his wife, and ate his friends. I believe that says it all about who Odysseus really is."
"I do not love this book, because I think wars are not a good topic to write about"
"Homer would be best left outside the circle of his fellow Greeks Sophocles and Plato and re-establish himself as a writer for SNL or maybe Married with Children. Were Homer alive today hew would no doubt be plotting out the next Buffy the Vampire Slayer storyboard as we speak."
"The only reason I think this is a 'classic' is because it is the only book written in it's time."
"this book is totally fake and pointless. there is nothing real about this book. Homer was wrong to write it. i read it only to learn his story"
"To smart for me. Like torture, reading should be enjoyable."
"I listened to it because it's one of those things everyone should read so that everything else will fit into proper context, but really, to my sarcastic and overfilled mind, it seems to be an elaborate tale of how one should treat guests to one's home."
"I could never like such silly things."
"This was just another story written by a man to be enjoyed by other men. Gross."
"yeah, it's a classic. but it actually isnt as good as you think"
"Our society has accustomed itself to fast paced action/adventure thrillers. The Odyssey is an epic filled with more figurative language than with deeds."
"Poetry is usually so academic in its use of language. Most Poets are professors who do NOT use the English language the way most modern people do. Their use of language is wooden, stilted, with unfamiliar and odd turns of phrase, use of words, etc. which all end up bewildering the reader. I had hoped that the reviews would be right for once, however. No such luck. I couldn't even get past the first ten pages with any comprehension of what this was about... What the heck is 'hearth smoke'? What person alive says 'that nonsense coming past your teeth'? Don't most people say 'past your lips'? If this is a 'readable' translation, they must mean to someone who speaks some odd form of Olde English because this does not read like any English I ever saw. Don't get suckered into thinking this just 'races' along. It does nothing of the sort. You will need to refer to the notes every few lines just to figure out what is being said. Why it is said so oddly and with such a poor sense of colloquial English and rhythmn is beyond me."
"This book sucks. I dont care if Homer was blind or not this book is like 900 pages too long. I could tell this story in about 10 pages. Homer taking all long to say stupid stuff."
"It sucked. Their shouldn't be old people in books."
"Homer's Odyssey is one of the worst books I have ever read in my life. This book is very, very boring. Many of you who do not know me, probably think I am a teenager who can't sit still, and that I have to take some drug to keep me from tearing my house down. You are very wrong. I'm not a teenager who can't sit still, but I am a teenager who can't stand bad books!
The Odyssey is somewhat like a fantasy novel, where many of the characters have super powers, and a lot of the events that happen aren't actually possible in the real world. Now, don't get me wrong, I love many books that aren't realistic, mostly science fiction, but this book is outrageously stupid! Greek society lived in some kind of fantasy world where gods looked down on them and determined what happened in the world. As an atheist, I can't stand this kind of thinking.
In general, epic novels are horrible, especially this one. As I said at the beginning of my review, The Odyssey by Homer is one of the worst books I have ever read."
"This book is two hundred and seventy- one words. I picked up this Library book because I am in love with the story 'Troy'. It makes the movie more put together. I know how the story of Odyssey went yet it didn't concur with me about the end of it."
I would never have read this if my crazy teacher hadn't said, 'Please hand in your books tomorrow morning so i can grade them and return them. Yes, I blame you Mr. L. He actually seems to like this book......Elevated speech or whatever is stupid--it just wastes space. Instead of saying, 'Oh, greetings to you, Nestor the Gerenian horseman. What brings you to my fine land. Who fair thee? Is your wife well or has she left you for another lesser man?' can't we just say, 'S'up?'"
"Odysseus and his men had to go on a journey, for some odd reason"
"But then again, it's supposed to be in Greek and it was written way back when people didn't know better, so ya can't blame poor Homer."
"Accoording to what i know about Odysseus i believe that he should not be in the Hero Hall of Fame Nomination Committee. He killed innocent people , cheated on his wife, and ate his friends. I believe that says it all about who Odysseus really is."
"I do not love this book, because I think wars are not a good topic to write about"
"Homer would be best left outside the circle of his fellow Greeks Sophocles and Plato and re-establish himself as a writer for SNL or maybe Married with Children. Were Homer alive today hew would no doubt be plotting out the next Buffy the Vampire Slayer storyboard as we speak."
"The only reason I think this is a 'classic' is because it is the only book written in it's time."
"this book is totally fake and pointless. there is nothing real about this book. Homer was wrong to write it. i read it only to learn his story"
"To smart for me. Like torture, reading should be enjoyable."
"I listened to it because it's one of those things everyone should read so that everything else will fit into proper context, but really, to my sarcastic and overfilled mind, it seems to be an elaborate tale of how one should treat guests to one's home."
"I could never like such silly things."
"This was just another story written by a man to be enjoyed by other men. Gross."
"yeah, it's a classic. but it actually isnt as good as you think"
"Our society has accustomed itself to fast paced action/adventure thrillers. The Odyssey is an epic filled with more figurative language than with deeds."
"Poetry is usually so academic in its use of language. Most Poets are professors who do NOT use the English language the way most modern people do. Their use of language is wooden, stilted, with unfamiliar and odd turns of phrase, use of words, etc. which all end up bewildering the reader. I had hoped that the reviews would be right for once, however. No such luck. I couldn't even get past the first ten pages with any comprehension of what this was about... What the heck is 'hearth smoke'? What person alive says 'that nonsense coming past your teeth'? Don't most people say 'past your lips'? If this is a 'readable' translation, they must mean to someone who speaks some odd form of Olde English because this does not read like any English I ever saw. Don't get suckered into thinking this just 'races' along. It does nothing of the sort. You will need to refer to the notes every few lines just to figure out what is being said. Why it is said so oddly and with such a poor sense of colloquial English and rhythmn is beyond me."
"This book sucks. I dont care if Homer was blind or not this book is like 900 pages too long. I could tell this story in about 10 pages. Homer taking all long to say stupid stuff."
"It sucked. Their shouldn't be old people in books."
"Homer's Odyssey is one of the worst books I have ever read in my life. This book is very, very boring. Many of you who do not know me, probably think I am a teenager who can't sit still, and that I have to take some drug to keep me from tearing my house down. You are very wrong. I'm not a teenager who can't sit still, but I am a teenager who can't stand bad books!
The Odyssey is somewhat like a fantasy novel, where many of the characters have super powers, and a lot of the events that happen aren't actually possible in the real world. Now, don't get me wrong, I love many books that aren't realistic, mostly science fiction, but this book is outrageously stupid! Greek society lived in some kind of fantasy world where gods looked down on them and determined what happened in the world. As an atheist, I can't stand this kind of thinking.
In general, epic novels are horrible, especially this one. As I said at the beginning of my review, The Odyssey by Homer is one of the worst books I have ever read."
"This book is two hundred and seventy- one words. I picked up this Library book because I am in love with the story 'Troy'. It makes the movie more put together. I know how the story of Odyssey went yet it didn't concur with me about the end of it."
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