Emily Wilson talks about translating 'The Odyssey'

"It is so good to be home. This is a picture of my nostos," tweeted University of Pennsylvania classical studies professor Emily Wilson on May 13, attaching a photographs of her two daughters. She had clearly missed her family during her lengthy tour of Great Britain and Australia to promote her critically acclaimed translation of Homer's "Odyssey."

If not an odyssey itself, the translation of the classic epic was at least a grand adventure. When she started on the project, Wilson had no clue of how long it would take or the myriad complex challenges that she was undertaking. In fact, it was not until she started on the gargantuan task that she realized she was also breaking new ground as the first woman to ever translate the saga into English: There have been 60 such translations since 1615, all by men.

Kathimerini interviewed Wilson by email following her...