Who Owns the Odyssey?

In its nearly three-thousand-year history, the Odyssey has undergone as many twists and turns as its protagonist does on his journey home to Ithaca. Its origins as oral poetry suggest countless revisions before it was even put into text—and many more followed, as translators have wrestled with how best to express Homer’s ancient Greek verse in their own languages. On this episode of Critics at Large, Vinson Cunningham, Naomi Fry, and Alexandra Schwartz consider the latest rendition, a film adaptation by the director Christopher Nolan. The movie’s two-hundred-and-fifty-million-dollar budget, A-list cast, and use of cutting-edge IMAX technology make it maximalist in every sense of the word. It’s elicited glowing reception from early viewers—and faced preëmptive criticism from the right. Drawing on the scholar Emily Wilson’s 2017 translation of the epic, Nolan has modernized the dialogue; his focus on the erosion of societal values also speaks directly to the anxieties of our era, in which so many norms and institutions feel newly precarious. “The Odyssey persists because the world does keep on evanescing behind us,” Cunningham says. “The question of how to move on is always fresh.”

Read, watch, and listen with the critics:

“The Odyssey” (2026)

“Planet of the Apes” (1968)

“Oppenheimer” (2023)

“Troy” (2004)

“Why the Odyssey Keeps Defeating Filmmakers,” by David Denby (The New Yorker)

“L’Odissea” (1968)

Emily Wilson’s translation of the Odyssey

Robert Fagles’s translation of the Odyssey

Daniel Mendelsohn’s translation of the Odyssey

“The Dark Knight” (2008)

Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”

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Critics at Large is a weekly discussion from The New Yorker which explores the latest trends in books, television, film, and more. Join us every Thursday as we make unexpected connections between classic texts and pop culture.

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