Who was Homeros, the blind wandering poet who sang his stories on the shores of ancient Greece in the 8th century BCE? And what is the epic he gave us, the Odysseia? In this opening lecture, Homeros himself explains why the story of Odysseus—a warrior who won a ten-year war, yet needed ten more years to find his way home—still speaks to us nearly three thousand years later.

After the fall of Troy, Odysseus's fleet is driven off course by divine wrath and arrives at the island of the Cyclopes—a lawless land of savagery. Trapped inside the towering limestone cave of the one-eyed giant Polyphemus, Odysseus must find a way to survive. Homeros reveals the cunning behind the name 'Nobody'—Outis—and the triple layers of wordplay that outwit the monster.

Aeolus, keeper of the winds, grants Odysseus a gift: a leather bag holding all the stormy winds, with only the gentlest breeze left free to carry him home. Ithaca is almost in sight when the crew's greed undoes everything—they open the bag, unleash a devastating storm, and are hurled back to the start. Then comes a second catastrophe: the cannibalistic Laestrygonians destroy eleven of the twelve ships. Homeros traces the bitter cost of human desire.

Down to a single ship, Odysseus lands on Aeaea, island of the goddess Circe—a terrifying sorceress who transforms men into animals. His crew are turned to swine. Alone, armed only with the mysterious herb moly given to him by Hermes, Odysseus confronts her. To trap a human mind inside a beast's body—keeping memory, consciousness, and the full capacity to suffer—is, Homeros tells us, the most savage act of all.

Following Circe's command, Odysseus descends—still breathing—into the House of Hades. At the misty edge of the world, he digs a trench of blood and summons the dead. The ghost of Elpenor who fell drunk from a rooftop. His own mother, Anticleia. The blind prophet Teiresias. And the great warrior Achilles, who would trade all his glory in death for one more day of life. Homeros asks: what does it mean to walk among the dead while still alive?

Three trials await Odysseus as he emerges from the underworld. The Sirens, whose sweet song lures sailors to their deaths. Scylla, the six-headed monster who snatches men from the deck. And Charybdis, a whirlpool that swallows the sea itself. Bound to the mast, Odysseus hears the Sirens' song and survives—but loses six men to Scylla and cannot save them. Homeros asks: when fate cannot be defeated, how does a human being choose?

What does individuality mean at the level of society? Won't a society where everyone lives their own way collapse into chaos? Mill argues that diversity is not a threat to social order—it is the very condition for progress and advancement.

After twenty years, Odysseus reaches Ithaca at last—but enters his own palace disguised as an aged beggar, transformed by Athena. In the hut of the loyal swineherd Eumaeus, his old dog Argos recognizes him with one wag of a tired tail before dying. In secret, Odysseus and his grown son Telemachus plan their revenge. Homeros tells us: true homecoming is not the moment of arrival—it is the act of reclaiming what is yours.

After twenty years of waiting, Penelope announces the contest of the bow: she will marry whoever can string Odysseus's great bow and shoot an arrow through twelve axe-heads in a row. The suitors fail even to string it. The disguised beggar takes the bow. First, the old dog Argos recognizes his master from a dung heap—and dies. Then the nurse Eurycleia finds the scar on his thigh. And then: one arrow through twelve axe-heads.

The judgment of the suitors. The reunion with Penelope—whose test of the olive-wood bed, rooted to the living earth, only one man can answer. The embrace of old Laertes in his orchard. Three generations—grandfather, father, son—standing together with spears raised. And then Athena's command: lay down your sword. From revenge to forgiveness, from war to peace. Homeros closes his epic of twelve thousand lines.