For nearly 3,000 years, Odysseus has been trying to get home.
His journey from Troy to Ithaca—through shipwrecks, monsters, sorceresses, temptations, betrayals and the wrath of the gods—has survived because The Odyssey has never belonged only to the ancient world. Every generation has found something new in it: a war story, an adventure, a meditation on exile, a portrait of marriage, a study of fathers and sons, or simply the eternal human longing to return to the place where we belong.
With Christopher Nolan bringing Homer’s epic to the big screen, there is no better time to revisit the original story—and the extraordinary collection of writers and artists who have reimagined it. Some have placed Penelope, Circe and the women of Ithaca at the center. Others have transported Odysseus to modern Dublin, sent him into outer space, turned the epic into a graphic novel or used it to explore their own families and journeys.
This is not a list of twelve versions of the same book. It is an eclectic voyage through translations, novels, memoir, comics, children’s literature and wildly inventive reinventions—all connected by one of the greatest stories ever told.
The Odyssey by Homer, translated by Emily Wilson
The essential starting point. Wilson’s lean, contemporary translation makes the epic feel immediate without flattening its poetry, violence or moral complications. It is probably the most welcoming doorway into Homer for a modern general reader.
Odyssey by Stephen Fry
For readers who want the story without beginning with ancient epic poetry. Fry retells Odysseus’ homeward journey—and the troubled returns of other Greek heroes—with humor, clarity and the instincts of a born storyteller.
Circe by Madeline Miller
The enchantress who transforms Odysseus’ men into pigs becomes the center of her own story. Miller expands Circe’s life far beyond her episode in Homer, turning a feared supporting character into a complicated woman confronting exile, power, motherhood and immortality.
The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood
Penelope finally gets to tell her side of the marriage—and she is considerably less impressed by Odysseus than Homer’s heroic tradition might suggest. Atwood also gives a chorus-like voice to the twelve maids executed after Odysseus returns.
Ithaca by Claire North
While Odysseus is sailing around the Mediterranean, Penelope is trying to hold his kingdom together. The first book in North’s Songs of Penelope trilogy places the women of Ithaca—and the political intelligence required for survival—at the heart of the story.
The Lost Books of the Odyssey by Zachary Mason
Not one retelling but forty-four strange, contradictory alternative versions. Odysseus forgets himself, stories turn inside out and Homer’s supposedly settled narrative becomes a literary hall of mirrors. This is the choice for readers who like Borges, Calvino and beautiful intellectual mischief.
The Odyssey: A Modern Sequel by Nikos Kazantzakis
Kazantzakis begins where Homer ends. His Odysseus returns to Ithaca, finds domestic peace intolerable and sets out again on an enormous philosophical journey. Divided into twenty-four sections and containing 33,333 verses, it is the most ambitious—and unquestionably the most daunting—book on this list.
Ulysses by James Joyce
Homer’s Mediterranean voyage becomes a single day in Dublin. Leopold Bloom wanders through the ordinary humiliations, appetites and encounters of modern life while Joyce builds an intricate network of parallels with Odysseus, Penelope and Telemachus. It is difficult, frequently maddening and impossible to exclude.
An Odyssey: A Father, a Son, and an Epic by Daniel Mendelsohn
A memoir rather than a retelling. Mendelsohn’s 81-year-old father enrolls in the undergraduate seminar on The Odyssey that his son teaches, transforming the ancient story into an unexpectedly moving examination of fathers, sons, aging and the things families never quite say aloud.
The Odyssey: A Graphic Novel by Gareth Hinds
Hinds translates Homer’s monsters, storms, battles and shifting identities into bold visual storytelling without reducing the epic to a cartoon summary. A handsome deluxe edition was released on May 12, 2026, making this one especially timely for the film’s arrival.
ODY-C: Cycle One by Matt Fraction and Christian Ward
The gloriously unhinged selection. Odysseus becomes Odyssia, the Trojan War becomes a century-long galactic conflict, and the voyage home unfolds as a psychedelic, gender-reimagined space opera. Proof that Homer can survive almost anything—including interstellar warfare.
Tales from the Odyssey by Mary Pope Osborne
A lively adaptation for younger readers and families. Osborne breaks the epic into accessible adventures filled with giants, witches, monsters, angry gods and the long struggle to reach Ithaca—without making the story feel like homework.
