The Greek gods were real kooks. It's a wonder any mortals survived their little spats. I don't understand the reverence this book receives, or the claim that it is the best story ever written. It contains dozens of digressions, dozens of redundancies and more unpronounceable names than there were pages in the book. If Homer had stuck to the story of Odysseus and told it with dispatch, the book would have been 100 pages long and fairly exciting. Still, since it has lasted this long, I don't suppose it's going away soon. At least now I can say I read it.