HORSE LATITUDE

Samuel F. Rindge (Letters, March 2) might himself carefully read “The Odyssey” before complaining that the story of the Trojan Horse, seen in the forthcoming TV version, doesn’t appear in the original.

Actually, in Book 4 of Homer’s poem, Odysseus’ son Telemachus hears about his father’s heroism inside the “hollow horse” from his old comrade in arms King Menelaus. And in a parallel father-son story in Book 11, Odysseus himself tells the resurrected spirit of the hero Achilles about the courage shown by Achilles’ son Neoptolemus--the only man inside who was not quaking with fear at the critical moment of opening the horse’s trapdoor.

ERIC MANKIN

Venice