The Homeric Question – by whom, when, where, and under what circumstances the Iliad and Odyssey were composed – continues to be debated. Hearing Homer’s Song: The Brief Life and Big Idea of Milman Parry by Robert Kanigal offers a fascinating answer.

Modern scholarship considers that the two works were written by different authors and were composed at some point around the late eighth or early seventh century BC.[3] Perry’s answer was very different:  no one and everyone, over a much longer period. 

Milman Parry was a brilliant and odd assistant professor of Greek at Harvard in the 1930’s who had an intriguing idea about Homer. His persistence led him to the opportunity to test it out — in the back country of Yugoslavia, searching for local singers of ancient stories and songs. 

The book tells you (too) much about Perry and his life, his ideas about oral poetry and his struggles to be accepted by his professional peers. Most interesting is the detailed description of his sixteen months in the Slavic wilds tracking down data to substantiate his theories and overturning accepted ideas.

It’s a story about scientific creativity, institutional rigidity, and a strange and ultimately tragic life. Definitely worth a read — and wait for the surprise ending.

— Ron Ebert