Samuel Butler (1835-1902)

:For the 17th-century author of Hudibras, see Samuel Butler (1612-1680).

Literary history/criticism

Butler developed a theory that the Odyssey came from the pen of a young Sicilian woman, and that the scenes of the poem reflected the coast of Sicily and its nearby islands. He described the evidence for this theory in his The Authoress of the Odyssey (1897) and in the introduction and footnotes to his prose translation of the Odyssey. Robert Graves elaborated on this hypothesis in his novel Homer's Daughter. Butler also translated the Iliad. His other works include Shakespeare's Sonnets Reconsidered (1899), a theory that the Bard's sonnets, if rearranged, tell a story about a homosexual affair.

Related Topics:
Odyssey - The Authoress of the Odyssey - Robert Graves - Iliad - Shakespeare

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