Singing Homer Podcast
Episodes
The Haunted Text: Music, Allusion, and Stagecraft in Homer’s Odyssey
25 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
The idea of ‘the haunted text’ began while confronting the problem of Persephone in the Odyssey, which in terms of the circulatory system of the S...
‘The Cheerless Place’: Homer in English
05 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 11.90-151‘Why ever, you wretched man, did you leave the light of the SunAnd come to see the corpses and the cheerless place?’ (Od.11.93-4)...
Elpenor’s Oar: Homer in English
30 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 11.20-89[Part 2 of ‘The Haunted Text’, on Persephone herself—perhaps the ultimate ‘background’ figure of those named in Homer’s fo...
The Gospel according to the Cimmerians—Homer in English
29 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 11.1-19And so the journey begins. Well, begins again. There is a new breath filling the sails, a second wind. It is in fact the breath of Circ...
Beyond Oceanus
16 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
On Odyssey 10.503-74 (end)This one might take a few sittings.I neglected to mention, when it was appropriate and to my point, that poplars and willows...
The Ballad of Elpenor, Pt.1—Homer in English
06 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 10.503-74We’ve already had two members of Odysseus’ crew named, amongst a number of occasions where they speak in chorus. Sometimes we get...
The Quickest Way to Hades
22 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
On Odyssey 10.408-502An especially happy discovery of these attempts at video presentations of my performance notes for Homer’s Odyssey, is that one...
‘Flesh beyond reckoning ...’—Homer in English
16 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 10.408-502Odysseus learns from Circe that he must travel to the Underworld, the house of Hades Invisible—his name seems to mean ‘invisible...
‘Her completely gorgeous bed of love’
22 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
On Odyssey 10.336-407Here is the latest of my audio-video readings of the notes I write for each of the performances of Homer in English. This one is ...
‘Her completely gorgeous bed of love’—Homer in English
19 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 10.336-407How long do Odysseus and Circe make love to each other? What a rude and intrusive question, but science can have little regard for p...
‘The flower was like milk’
07 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
On Odyssey 10.274-335The presentation here has developed since the original post, so do have a watch.My partner suggests a possibility for the moly (μ...
‘The flower was like milk’: Homer in English
28 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 10.274-335So Odysseus heads away from the sea up through the ‘sacred glades of Circe,’ and is about to arrive at Circe’s house, when he ...
Behind Blue Eyes: 'Yet the Mind Within Stayed Steady’
17 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
On Odyssey 10.230-73I understand that my beloved alma mater, the University of Chicago, has decided to ‘pause’ the admission of graduate students ...
‘Yet the mind within stayed steady’: Homer in English
12 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 10.230-73Out she came fast and opened the shining doorsAnd started inviting them: and all together, they followed in their stupidity.Eurylochu...
Catastrophe of the Comedy
31 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
On Odyssey 10.187-229A friend who follows the substack told me that for various reasons, it was quite an ordeal for him to read the essays for ‘Home...
Catastrophe of the Comedy: Disorientation and the Sun—Homer in English
25 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 10.187-229“Ah friends … I mean, we don’t even know in which direction is the dusk nor which the Dawn,Nor where Helius, shining for morta...
And Fred fell down in the dust with a moan; out flew his life’s breath—Homer in English
13 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 10.135-86The line in my title, said in this case about Fred, recurs through the Iliad upon the despatching of a warrior. Many a man experience...
‘Beefy Laestrygonians’—Homer in English
26 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 10.80-134The episode of the Laestrygonians is a mix of old and new, familiar and unfamiliar. I suppose that in these episodes of Odysseus’ w...
“The Power Is In You”—Homer in English
13 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 10.1-79Aeolus is often described as the ‘god of the winds’. Homer does not call him a god, however; he is simply Aeolus son of Hippotas. H...
The Cyclops and the Platonic Soul: “If only I had the power over soul and life/To castrate you …”—Homer in English
25 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 9.506-66 (end)A lot is made of Odysseus’ second vaunt to the Cyclops when he’s already escaped and on board ship. And rightly so; the cry ...
‘City-Sacker’—Homer in English
14 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 9.415-505The thing is, Odysseus is a bit of a nobody. He announces himself to the Cyclops as ‘Odysseus the City-Sacker’ (Ὀδυσσεὺς...
“For that ... is where iron gets its strength”—Homer in English
24 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 9.306-414Today’s passage contains the one absolutely definite, 100% certifiable joke in Homer’s Odyssey. It scarcely needs pointing out th...
“Draw the sharp sword from by my thigh ...”—Homer in English
27 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 9.193-305The world of the Odyssey is one where drugs and potations are often the first option for use in a pinch. One should have thought that...
“She is Widowed of Men”—Homer in English
14 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 9.105-92“Next there’s an island”: the ἔπειτα of narration signals what happens next in time. In argument it signals a consequence...
“I am Odysseus”—Homer in English
28 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 9.1-104What’s in a name? Most Greek names are transparent, like ‘Smith’ or ‘Carpenter’. ‘Alcinous’ is a ‘Brave Mind’, ‘Tel...
‘But Odysseus began to melt ...’: Homer in English
11 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 8.499-586ταῦτ’ ἄρ’ ἀϝοιδὸς ἄϝειδε περικλυτός · αὐτὰρ Ὀδυσσεύςτήκετο, δ...
“You *Lifed* Me, Girl”—Homer in English
03 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 8.381-498We are building inexorably to the telling of Odysseus’ famous tale of his wanderings, which it seems we must already know to some e...
The Over-Thinker: Homer in English
20 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 8.256-380I’m not one for the ‘god of war’ and ‘god of love’ shtick. Such formulations do not advance any understanding, of either lo...
‘The stone boomed and whizzed’: Homer in English
01 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 8.96-255I continue to be impressed by how fully realised are the dramatic presences in Homer. Most every character who speaks in the Odyssey h...
A blind bard and a big purple cloak: Homer in English
17 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 8.1-95The dawn rises now upon the most extraordinary book, Book 8 of Homer’s Odyssey. We finally start to peel the onion. Athena somewhat co...
“We’re a jealous lot on the ground, the tribes of mankind”: Homer in English
07 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 7.261-347 (end)Let me call attention to two moments in the close of Odysseus’ speech to Queen Arete. The first is Odysseus’ comment that C...
‘Odysseus the Clever, the Variegated Plotter’: Homer in English
27 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 7.167-260: Polymētis OdysseusAlcinous reveals the Phaeacians to be something of a throwback, in the mythic scheme of things. He announces his...
‘Ripening Fig on Fig’: Homer in English
19 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 7.84-166I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine,With swe...
‘The city—ravishing and longed for—’: Homer in English
10 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 7.1-83Ancient Greek writers were the source of many of the genres of literature, and academic disciplines, that still get sorted into various ...
‘She applied the whip with judgement’: Homer in English
17 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 6.285-331 (end)Off Odysseus goes down the yellow brick road, following the mule car of Nausicaa and a gaggle of her attendants. The passage is...
The Liquid Mortal: Homer in English
14 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 6.198-284“Do you take him for a robber or a murderer? Neither he nor any one else can come here to do us Phaeacians any harm, for we are dea...
“I am at your knees, Milady”: Homer in English
07 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 6.110-197The thing about Odysseus and Nausicaa, is that nothing happens. They do not touch; he says the words of a suppliant who holds the kne...
Being and Becoming Nausicaa: Homer in English
28 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 6.1-109These lines are about girls bathing and playing naked in the woods. Everything seems meant to arouse. They throw off their veils and pl...
An Octopus’s Bedroom: Homer in English
20 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 5.424-93 (end)When Odysseus escapes the surge and clings to the rugged cliff face—at Athena’s prompt!—but is then ripped off and tossed ...
A Human Voice, Speaking Mortal Language: Homer in English
10 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 5.327-423We know this experience when dealing with the Department of Motor Vehicles, or on the phone with the cable company, of finding a symp...
Man on a Raft: Homer in English
31 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 5.228-326Is it a man on a raft, or the man on a raft; or is it this man, long-suffering Odysseus, adrift on a raft on the wilful, monstrous, g...
“For she is mortal, but you are deathless and free from ageing ...”: Homer in English
24 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 5.116-227Odysseus does not explain himself. He just says it. When Calypso asks him the obvious thing—how can he choose an ageing Penelope an...
‘Singing Long Vowels in a Lovely Voice’: Homer in English
15 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 5.1-115I suppose the second council of the gods, echoing the opening one in Book 1, is a bit of a concession from Homer. Now we’re getting b...
‘As often as a lion changes his mind’: Homer in English
09 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 4.742-847Homer compares Penelope’s state of mind, before she falls asleep, to that of a male lion encircled craftily by huntsmen; her though...
Noemon!: Homer in English
04 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 4.625-741Noemon’s charming cameo in Odyssey 4, when he walks in among the suitors who are throwing the discus and hurling javelins, was my f...
To the Elysian Plain: Homer in English
27 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 4.464-624In the Iliad, Homer’s narrator addresses Menelaus in the second person—him and Patroclus. The hapless-seeming, cuckolded brother ...
“Who Would Go To Bed With A Sea Monster?”: Homer in English
19 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 4.306-463There is a great non sequitur in Telemachus plea to Menelaus. When he says “that’s why I’ve come to these your knees,” we exp...
Nepenthe: Homer in English
10 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 4.155-305I have translated νηπενθές ‘anti-depressant’, which is a depressing thing to do. The mere sound of some of Homer’s word...
‘Out Comes Helen’: Homer in English
04 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 4.1-154Just like Helen, the fading beauty queen, there is a sense of expectations cheated as they’re met, of things being cut down to size i...
“A virgin: who never yet was brought under the yoke by a man”—Homer in English
19 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 3.330-497 (end)The sacrifice of the heifer, with the women of Nestor’s house ululating in ecstasy, seems to demand a symbolic reading; what ...
‘He wants it—she wants it!’: Homer in English
10 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 3.201-329Why does Homer introduce a singer and poet into the story of Aegisthus and Clytemnestra? In Nestor’s telling, Agamemnon left behind...
‘Ajax Lies There’: Homer in English
07 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 3.1-200Meeting Nestor is like watching a reunion special for a 20-year-old show. There is that same awkward sense that things will never be th...
Traveller’s Wind: Homer in English
03 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 2.323-434 (end)Since I started again after my illness, I’ve now spent two years without performing past Book 4 of the Odyssey. Now, I have t...
‘Yesterday’s God’: Homer in English
31 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 2.157-322This episode marks the first—and I believe, only—in-person appearance of Mentor, Odysseus’ appointed estate manager, in the who...
‘She Stood Up A Great Loom And Began Weaving A Web ...’—Homer in English
28 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 2.1-156Spread the word! We’re editing, translating, and performing Homer’s Odyssey, in English (on the podcast) and Greek (in Substack), a...
‘That was a god!’: Homer in English
23 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 1.306-444 (end)What are Telemachus’ redeeming qualities? Let me know in chat about the way he treats his mother.We have already seen Telemac...
“Mother says that I am his ...”: Homer in English
20 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 1.136-305One of the reasons I included Samuel Butler’s translation in earlier posts, is that he alone, I feel, has captured the comic tone o...
‘Versify my man, Muse ...’: Homer in English
16 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Odyssey 1.1-135We begin the great tale of the Odyssey again, with articulated breath. All recordings will be free, but let me encourage subscribers to...
The Articulated Breath of Homer
05 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Ἄνδρά μοι ἔννεπε, Μοῦσα, πολύτροπον, ὃς μάλα πολλάπλάγχθη, ’πεὶ Τροίης ἱερ...
Tragic Iambs!
23 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The shaping and self-organising of phrases in recitation is the ultimate proof in the pudding, that the law of tonal prominence has at last released t...
Performing Greek Prose
18 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The key to reading Greek aloud—that is, the first step in treating ancient texts in the way that they were intended to be used—is to know which sy...
Homer's Odyssey δ 4.571-92
22 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Recording and translation © A. P. David 2022.Greek text hyperlinked to lexica via Perseus (perseus.tufts.edu):αὐτὰρ ἐγὼν ἐπὶ νῆα...
Homer's Odyssey δ 4.554-70
09 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Recording and translation © A. P. David 2022.Greek text hyperlinked to lexica via Perseus (perseus.tufts.edu):ὣς ἐφάμην, ὁ δέ μ᾽ αὐ...
Homer's Odyssey δ 4.538-53
06 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Recording and translation © A. P. David 2022.Greek text hyperlinked to lexica via Perseus (perseus.tufts.edu):ὣς ἔφατ᾽, αὐτὰρ ἐμο...
Homer's Odyssey δ 4.512-37
03 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Recording and translation © A. P. David 2022.Greek text hyperlinked to lexica via Perseus (perseus.tufts.edu):‘σὸς δέ που ἔκφυγε κ...
Homer's Odyssey δ 4.484-511
04 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Recording and translation ©A. P. David 2022.Greek text hyperlinked to lexica via Perseus (perseus.tufts.edu):ἀλλὰ καὶ ὣς μύθοισιν...
The Wine Bowl of Freedom, pt. 3 of 3
01 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
‘δαιμονίη μή μοί τι λίην ἀκαχίζεο θυμῷ:οὐ γάρ τίς μ᾽ ὑπὲρ αἶσαν ἀνὴρ Ἄϝϊδι πρ...
The Wine Bowl of Freedom, Pt. 2 of 3
27 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
‘δᾶϝερ ἐμεῖο κυνὸς κακομηχάνου ὀκρυοέσσης,ὥς μ᾽ ὄφελ᾽ ἤματι τῷ ὅτε με πρῶτ...
The Wine Bowl of Freedom, pt. 1 of 3
25 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
ὣς οἵ γ᾽ ἀμφίεπον τάφον Ἕκτορος ἱπποδάμοιο.This is the last line of the Iliad: ‘So did the men arrange the...
Homer's Odyssey 3 (γ)—in English!
08 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Translation © A. P. David 2022 This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit ...
Homer's Odyssey 2 (β)—in English!
17 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Translation © A. P. David 2022. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit...
Vindicating Quintilian: Latin Has A Pitch Accent!
15 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
3. Quintilian’s witnessIt is often claimed that Quintilian’s description of the Latin accent is hampered or confused by the use of descriptive ter...
Homer's Odyssey 1 (α)—in English!
19 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit homerist.substack.com/subscribe
Odyssey Attic Dramatic
06 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
This performance indulges the actor more than the reciter. It serves to demonstrate the histrionic possibilities inherent in the composition when it i...
Odyssey 1.31-43
26 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
David’s Performance TextThe most prominent syllables under the new theory of the ancient accent are printed in bold; syllables are seasoned with occ...
Homer's Odyssey 1.11-30
26 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
David’s Performance Text:ἔνθ᾽ ἄλλοι μὲν πάντες, ὅσοι φύγον αἰπὺν ὄλεθρον,οἴκοι ἔσαν, πόλ...
Odyssey 1.1-10
24 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
David’s performance text:The most prominent syllables under the new theory of the ancient accent are printed in bold. On occasion the presence of di...