Department of English

In his 1952 film "Voyage in Italy," Roberto Rossellini has a couple named Joyce (George Sanders and Ingrid Bergman) set out on a journey to settle the estate of their uncle Homer. This, in a sense, is also the object of this course. Reading Homer's Odyssey and Joyce's Ulysses side-by-side, we will consider how Joyce's use of Homer both defines his own project and provides a fresh perspective from which to return to the Odyssey. Both texts will be examined as works of epic scope that summon up an entire world, whether ancient Greece or early twentieth century Dublin, and as meditations on the nature of heroism, the value of ordinary experience, the relations of men and women, and the techniques and purposes of story-telling.