SHORTLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE 2017 SHORTLISTED FOR THE LONDON HELLENIC PRIZE 2017 WINNER OF THE PRIX MÉDITERRANÉE 2018From the award-winning best-selling writer: a deeply moving tale of a father and son’s transformative journey in reading - and reliving - Homer’s epic masterpiece.When eighty-one-year-old Jay Mendelsohn decides to enrol in the undergraduate seminar on the Odyssey that his son Daniel teaches at Bard College the two find themselves on an adventure as profoundly emotional as it is intellectual. For Jay a retired research scientist who sees the world through a mathematician’s unforgiving eyes this return to the classroom is his ‘one last chance’ to learn the great literature he’d neglected in his youth - and even more a final opportunity to understand his son.But through the sometimes uncomfortable months that follow as the two men explore Homer’s great work together - first in the classroom where Jay persistently challenges his son’s interpretations and then during a surprise-filled Mediterranean journey retracing Odysseus’ legendary voyages - it becomes clear that Daniel has much to learn too. For Jay’s responses to both the text and the travels gradually uncover long-buried secrets that allow the Daniel to understand his difficult father at last. As this intricately woven memoir builds to its wrenching climax Mendelsohn’s narrative comes to echo the Odyssey itself with its timeless themes of deception and recognition marriage and children the pleasures of travel and the meaning of home.Rich with literary and emotional insight An Odyssey is a renowned writer’s most revelatory entwining yet of personal narrative and literary exploration.In this long-listed autobiography Mendelsohn explores the intricate relationships within a family set against the backdrop of Greece. It's a top winner a European tale that's been short-listed for its poetic exploration of human figures.For fans of Bart Van Es (The Cut Out Girl) Winfried Georg Sebald (The Rings of Saturn) and Thomas Harding (Hanns and Rudolf).
