The Odyssey | Page 3

the "Odyssey" with the Iliadic passages printed
in a different type, and with marginal references. I have given the
British Museum a copy of the "Odyssey" with the Iliadic passages
underlined and referred to in MS.; I have also given an "Iliad" marked
with all the Odyssean passages, and their references; but copies of both
the "Iliad" and "Odyssey" so marked ought to be within easy reach of
all students.
Any one who at the present day discusses the questions that have arisen
round the "Iliad" since Wolf's time, without keeping it well before his
reader's mind that the "Odyssey" was demonstrably written from one
single neighbourhood, and hence (even though nothing else pointed to
this conclusion) presumably by one person only--that it was written
certainly before 750, and in all probability before 1000 B.C.--that the
writer of this very early poem was demonstrably familiar with the
"Iliad" as we now have it, borrowing as freely from those books whose
genuineness has been most impugned, as from those which are
admitted to be by Homer--any one who fails to keep these points before
his readers, is hardly dealing equitably by them. Any one on the other
hand, who will mark his "Iliad" and his "Odyssey" from the copies in
the British Museum above referred to, and who will draw the only
inference that common sense can draw from the presence of so many
identical passages in both poems, will, I believe, find no difficulty in
assigning their proper value to a large number of books here and on the
Continent that at present enjoy considerable reputations. Furthermore,
and this perhaps is an advantage better worth securing, he will find that
many puzzles of the "Odyssey" cease to puzzle him on the discovery
that they arise from over-saturation with the "Iliad."
Other difficulties will also disappear as soon as the development of the
poem in the writer's mind is understood. I have dealt with this at some
length in pp. 251-261 of "The Authoress of the Odyssey". Briefly, the
"Odyssey" consists of two distinct poems: (1) The Return of Ulysses,
which alone the Muse is asked to sing in the opening lines of the poem.
This poem includes the Phaeacian episode, and the account of Ulysses'

adventures as told by himself in Books ix.-xii. It consists of lines 1-79
(roughly) of Book i., of line 28 of Book v., and thence without
intermission to the middle of line 187 of Book xiii., at which point the
original scheme was abandoned.
(2) The story of Penelope and the suitors, with the episode of
Telemachus' voyage to Pylos. This poem begins with line 80 (roughly)
of Book i., is continued to the end of Book iv., and not resumed till
Ulysses wakes in the middle of line 187, Book xiii., from whence it
continues to the end of Book xxiv.
In "The Authoress of the Odyssey", I wrote:
the introduction of lines xi., 115-137 and of line ix., 535, with the
writing a new council of the gods at the beginning of Book v., to take
the place of the one that was removed to Book i., 1-79, were the only
things that were done to give even a semblance of unity to the old
scheme and the new, and to conceal the fact that the Muse, after being
asked to sing of one subject, spend two-thirds of her time in singing a
very different one, with a climax for which no-one has asked her. For
roughly the Return occupies eight Books, and Penelope and the Suitors
sixteen.
I believe this to be substantially correct.
Lastly, to deal with a very unimportant point, I observe that the Leipsic
Teubner edition of 894 makes Books ii. and iii. end with a comma.
Stops are things of such far more recent date than the "Odyssey," that
there does not seem much use in adhering to the text in so small a
matter; still, from a spirit of mere conservatism, I have preferred to do
so. Why [Greek] at the beginnings of Books ii. and viii., and [Greek], at
the beginning of Book vii. should have initial capitals in an edition far
too careful to admit a supposition of inadvertence, when [Greek] at the
beginning of Books vi. and xiii., and [Greek] at the beginning of Book
xvii. have no initial capitals, I cannot determine. No other Books of the
"Odyssey" have initial capitals except the three mentioned unless the
first word of the Book is a proper name.

S. BUTLER. July 25, 1900.

Preface to Second Edition
Butler's Translation of the "Odyssey" appeared originally in 1900, and
The Authoress of the Odyssey in 1897. In the preface to the new
edition of "The Authoress", which is published simultaneously with
this new edition of the Translation, I