A Story of the Golden Age

You have heard of Homer and of the two wonderful poems the Iliad and the Odyssey which bear his name. No one knows whether these poems were composed by Homer or whether they are the work of many different poets. And in fact it matters very little about their authorship. Everybody agrees that they are the grandest poems ever sung or written or read in this world; and yet how few persons comparatively have read them or know any thing about them except at second-hand! Homer commences his story not at the beginning but in the midst of things; hence when one starts out to read the Iliad without having made some special preparation beforehand he finds it hard to understand and is tempted in despair to stop at the end of the first book. Many people are therefore content to admire the great masterpiece of poetry and story-telling simply because others admire it and not because they have any personal acquaintance with it.Now it is not my purpose to give you a simplified version of the Iliad or the Odyssey. There are already many such versions; but the best way for you or any one else to read Homer is to read Homer. If you do not understand Greek you can read him in one of the many English translations. You will find much of the spirit of the original in the translations by Bryant by Lord Derby and by old George Chapman as well as in the admirable prose rendering by Butcher and Lang; but you can get none of it in any so-called simplified version.My object in writing this Story of the Golden Age has been to pave the way if I dare say it to an enjoyable reading of Homer either in translations or in the original. I have taken the various legends relating to the causes of the Trojan war and by assuming certain privileges never yet denied to story-tellers have woven all into one continuous narrative ending where Homer's story begins. The hero of the Odyssey--a character not always to be admired or commended--is my hero.