Profs & Pints Nashville: The Odyssey’s Journey

Profs and Pints Nashville presents: “The Odyssey’s Journey,” on an epic poem and its many cultural destinations, with Chiara Sulprizio, principal senior lecturer in Classical and Mediterranean Studies at Vanderbilt University and teacher of courses on Greek mythology and on Homer and the Trojan War.

Christopher Nolan’s hit film adaptation of The Odyssey is but the latest of countless creative works that Homer’s epic poem has inspired over the past 2500 years. If seeing—or planning to see—the new film has left you yearning for a refresher on Homer’s poem and a discussion of why it resonates so powerfully, you’ll want to set a course for Nashville’s Fait La Force taproom.

Speaking on Homer’s foundational text and its enduring legacy will be Chiara Sulprizio, a scholar of the classics and antiquity who previously has given excellent Profs and Pints talks on Roman gladiators and ancient Greek romance.

We’ll start by reviewing some of the basics about the Odyssey’s authorship, structure, and main characters. Then we’ll dive into a deeper discussion of its central themes, including nostos, or homecoming, and its relationship to Odysseus’ kleos, or glory.

We’ll look at Odysseus’ role as a different kind of hero and his signature quality of metis, or cleverness. You’ll become familiar with xenia, or the law of hospitality, and its importance to social relations in ancient Greece.

Dr. Sulprizio also will examine the central role of female figures like Penelope, Nausicaa, Calypso and Circe, who serve as both helpers and harmers in the poem.

Finally, we will explore the relationship between Homer’s epic and Nolan’s film, considering what Nolan changed, what he left out, and what stayed the same. We will also look at Nolan's choices in light of those made by other filmmakers who have adapted the epic, such as the Coen Brothers in Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000) and more recently, Uberto Pasolini in The Return (2024).

In each instance, we will ponder the broader messages that these works want to convey to their audiences about love, war, and the human condition. We also will examine what they tell us about the similarities and differences between life in the modern world and life in late Bronze Age Greece. (Advance tickets: $13.50 plus sales tax and processing fees. Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID.)

Image: From an 1891 painting of Odysseus and the sirens by John William Waterhouse (National Gallery of Victoria / Public Domain).