Crossing The Wine Dark Sea
Cut along the dashed lines and pass the cards around the table.
Where did you first meet Homer, if you have: a classroom, a children's version, a film, a myth someone told you? Tell us about that first encounter and how it felt.
Is there a word in a language you know that you have never been able to translate for someone? Say it out loud for us and try anyway.
Wilson treats every word choice as something that matters. Was there a moment in her explanation of the work that made you feel protective of a particular word or phrase?
The sea in Homer is famously described with colors that do not match what we see. How did sitting with that strangeness make you feel: unsettled, delighted, a little homesick for a world we cannot quite picture?
Translation asks someone to speak in another person's voice for years at a time. Have you ever had to carry someone else's words faithfully (a letter, a eulogy, a grandparent's story), and what did that feel like in your body?
The Odyssey is, at heart, about trying to get home. What did reading a piece about that poem stir up in you about your own idea of home right now?
Wilson makes the case that there is no neutral translation, that someone is always choosing. Did that comfort you or unsettle you, and did it change how you feel about any beloved book you have only read in English?
By the end of the piece, what feeling were you left holding: awe at the difficulty, warmth toward the translator, restlessness to go read Homer, something else entirely? Try to name it without summarizing how she gets there.