Son of nobody A novel

In the inspired latest from Booker winner Martel (Life of Pi), a literature scholar discovers an alternate account of the Trojan War. Harlow Donne, a Canadian PhD student, has left behind his failing marriage and his young daughter, Helen, for a year's scholarship at Oxford. There, his dissertation on Homer's Iliad is sidelined by his discovery of a long-lost work titled The Psoad, whose hero is not highborn like Homer's Achilles but a Greek commoner: Psoas of Midea, son of nobody. In passages of The Psoad translated by Donne, the reader learns of Psoas's feats and trials, including his battle with Prince Mestor of Troy, to whom Psoas declares, "I am no less of a man than you are." Like The Iliad, The Psoad is in dactylic hexameter, but Donne opts to render it in a more accessible style, which he describes as "an unfettered, bare-boned attempt at Greek folk dance." In Donne's own story, which unfurls in footnotes to the translation, the scholar muses on the line between fact and fiction, human nature and sorrow, and the power of Homer's Iliad compared to the Gospels. Some may find Martel's grand motifs a bit overdrawn, but his hero's devotion for ancient poetry is contagious ("The authority of the Gospels relies on its claim to truth, while that of The Iliad relies on its power to captivate"). It's an appealing labor of love. (Mar.)

The Canadian author ofLife of Pi (2001), etc., returns with a brilliant novel of ideas. Martel's protagonist, Canadian classicist Harlow Donne, has stumbled across a shattered piece of pottery that opens the door to a hitherto unknown epic poem,The Psoad, recounting the Trojan War from the point of view of an ordinary soldier named Psoas (pronounce it "so as"). One of the commoners who fought the war for their royal masters, Psoas says--in the epic poem that forms the backbone of Martel's story--"We will make good of our time here. / To take from the rich Trojans, what a dream." Alas, wealth is fleeting: "Each man, of his pile of loot, cried in a rage, / 'Mine! Mine! Mine!' For nothing. It all vanished." So, too, is life fleeting: In a memorable turn, Psoas, having performed Achilles-like acts of heroism in combat but taken the usual furious atrocities a step too far, descends into hell, there to converse with none other than Hades himself, who has a striking thought: "All mortals come to me the same, equal. / If they die equal, why should they not live equal?" Parallel to this imagined Greek text is a running footnoted commentary, part faux academic and part plain-spoken: Donne observes, in just the right formulation, that "in Greek epic, no one listens and no one gets along. Then there's hell to pay." True that. The commentary runs deeper, though, for in it Donne also relates the good fortune that once brought him love and a family and the shocking tragedy that shatters them--though Donne, who is seemingly indifferent to anything outside his scholarship, can hardly be bothered to face up to his responsibilities. The story is a powerful meditation on life, death, and the vanity of human wishes, all illustrated by a poem that would do Homer proud. A stunningly imagined revisitation of an ancient past that is every bit as awful as the present. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.