 
Word of the Week
Word of the Week is compiled by experienced lexicographers who draw on huge computer resources of current usage normally accessible only to university departments and dictionary publishers.
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Odyssey
The Odyssey is a Greek poem from around 3,000 years ago. Probably composed by the poet Homer, it describes the ten-year journey home of the hero Odysseus after fighting in the Trojan wars.
The word is now most familiar from the title of the 1969 science fiction film 2001: A Space Odyssey directed by Stanley Kubrick, which also describes a journey, this time into space to meet an alien life form.
Whether looking into the past or the future, the word 'odyssey' refers to a long journey or adventure. Many books have used the title of Stanley Kubrick's film as the starting point for their own title, such as Lost In Music: A Pop Odyssey or Hyperspace: A Scientific Odyssey. The chef Rick Stein called his recent book and TV series Seafood Odyssey', and there was even a recent piece of writing about the US presidential candidate Al Gore called '2001: A Gore Odyssey'!
A tour of America has been described as 'an odyssey through the world of modern music' partly because America is such a huge country and partly because so many forms of modern music originally came from America.
Because many journeys involve people learning or wanting to learn things as they travel, an odyssey can also refer to something that is like a quest and involves people finding out about themselves. So, someone can set out on 'a personal odyssey to recapture the glories of his youth', or a musician's music can be described as a 'spiritual odyssey', or a tennis player can be said to be 'embarking on her Wimbledon odyssey'.
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