The Odyssey: A Mythical Journey Through The Real World

Nearly three thousand years after Homer wrote his epic poem, The Odyssey is finding a new audience, thanks to Christopher Nolan's film adaptation. This guide brings that mythological world into the present day, plotting real-life locations for where Odysseus and his crew travelled, matching monster-haunted islands and cursed straits to places you can visit. The suggestions are informed by centuries of scholarship. Hisarlık in north-western Turkey was excavated by the dynamite-loving archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann and is now recognised under UNESCO protection as the site of Troy. One scholar pins the man-eating Laestrygonians to northern Sardinia, home to eight-foot Nuragic giant statues unearthed in the 1970s. Then there's Stromboli, still erupting regularly enough to have convinced the Greeks a god lived there, and the Strait of Messina, whipped by currents still notorious enough to explain Scylla and Charybdis. A cast of characters at the back runs through the gods, mortals and monsters for anyone who needs reminding who did what to whom. The guide comes in a fold-out format with 10 A5 panels, litho-printed in Sussex on sustainably sourced 300gsm stock. Written by Laura Coffey Design and illustration by Vanessa Lovegrove