Homer, name traditionally assigned to the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, the two main epic poems of Greek antiquity. Nothing is known about Homer as an individual, and indeed it is a matter of controversy whether a single person can be said to have written both the Iliad and the Odyssey. Linguistic and historical evidence, however, suggests that the poems were composed in Greek settlements on the western coast of Asia Minor in the 8th century BC. Both epics are written in an elaborate style, using language too impersonal and formal for the ordinary. speech. The metric form is dactylic hexameter (see Versification). Stylistically it is not possible to make a real distinction between the two works. Since ancient times, however, many readers have believed that they were written by different people. The Iliad deals with passions, with insoluble dilemmas. It has no real villains; Achilles, Agamemnon, Priam and the others are involved, as actors and victims, in a cruel and ultimately tragic universe. In the Odyssey, however, the wicked are destroyed, law prevails and the family is reunited. Here the rational intellect - that of Odysseus in particular - serves as a guiding force throughout the story. In addition to the Iliad and the Odyssey, the so-called Homeric Hymns, a series of relatively short poems celebrating the various gods and composed in a style similar to those of the epic, have also traditionally been attributed to Homer. The Odyssey describes the return of the Greek hero Odysseus from the Trojan War. The opening scenes describe the disorder that has arisen in Odysseus' family during his long absence: a band of suitors live off his wealth while he courts his wife Penelope. The epic then tells of Ulysses' ten-year journey, during which he must face dangers such as the man-eating giant Polyphemus and more subtle threats such as the goddess Calypso, who offers him immortality if he abandons the search for home. The second half of the poem begins with Odysseus's arrival on his home island of Ithaca. Here, exercising infinite patience and self-control, Ulysses tests the loyalty of his servants; plots and carries out bloody revenge on Penelope's suitors; and is reunited with his son, his wife and his elderly father Penelope, in Greek mythology, daughter of Icarius, king of Sparta, and wife of Odysseus, king of Ithaca. Penelope and Odysseus had a son, Telemachus.