/lit/ - Literature

>>21842711
>Written in iambic pentameter verse, Emily Wilson's Odyssey is a lean, fleet-footed translation that recaptures Homer’s “nimble gallop” and brings an ancient epic to new life
fucking iambic fleet-nimbled lean-galloped literary equivalent of a vaginal discharge

Both translators jazz it up. Compare Rodney Merrill’s literal translation

>>21842711
Should I read a book on mythology (Hamilton or Graves) before the Iliad and the Odyssey?
Won't that "spoil" some plots?

>>21842845
Yes you should read the backstory about Achilles, about his prophecy and so on.
>Won't that "spoil" some plots?
Are you a redneck or something?
What spoilers? Achilles dies, Troy falls, Odysseys returns home. Nigga you never heard about it?

continuing from where OP left off.
Willis
>But come, tell me about my son. Do you have news? Did he march off to war to be a leader? And what about my father Peleus? Does he still have good standing among all the Myrmidons? Or do they treat him badly in Phthia and Greece, since he is old and frail?

Fagles
>But come, tell me the news about my gallant son. Did he make his way to the wars, did the boy become a champion—yes or no? Tell me of noble Peleus, any word you’ve heard—still holding pride of place among his Myrmidon hordes, or do they despise the man in Hellas and in Phthia because old age has lamed his arms and legs?

Butler
>“‘Say not a word,’ he answered, ‘in death’s favour; I would rather be a paid servant in a poor man’s house and be above ground than king of kings among the dead.
>But give me news about my son; is he gone to the wars and will he be a great soldier, or is this not so? Tell me also if you have heard anything about my father Peleus—does he still rule among the Myrmidons, or do they show him no respect throughout Hellas and Phthia now that he is old and his limbs fail him?

Murray (1919)
>Nay, seek not to speak soothingly to me of death, glorious Odysseus. I should choose, so I might live on earth,1 to serve as the hireling of another, [490] of some portionless man whose livelihood was but small, rather than to be lord over all the dead that have perished.
>But come, tell me tidings of my son, that lordly youth, whether or not he followed to the war to be a leader. And tell me of noble Peleus, if thou hast heard aught, whether he still has honor among the host of the Myrmidons, or whether men do him dishonor throughout Hellas and Phthia, because old age binds him hand and foot.

>>21842711
>Fagles translation
>By god, I’d rather slave on earth for another man
This is a huge translation error, by the way.

>>21842869
I don't mean spoiling the major plot points, I just wonder if those books are summaries.

>>21842872
Butler's translation seems pretty good

>>21842882
Normally Fagles' use of contemporary phrases really bugs me, but I do think "I'd rather slave on earth for another man" rather fits the dramatic sensibilities of the moment, and in colloquial english, it scans as basically identical to saying "I'd rather be a peasant".

>>21842892
I like it too. It's from 1900 but doesn't appear archaic at all, unike Murray's.
Link: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1727
>>21842911
yeah, it's likely to be a deliberate dramatization. I like Murray's version of this part
>to serve as the hireling of another
Love to compare translations, almost always do this before starting a new book.

>>21842812
This and Lattimore are the only worthwhile ones

>>21842882
>translation error
Unlikely. I bet Fagles deliberately put it there

>>21842806
>Written in iambic pentameter verse
How pointless seeing how that's not what it was originally written in so what's the point?
In saying that I quite enjoy Rieu translation. It's quite dry but seems faithful (the revision anyway) and captures the time and culture well. Anybody else read it?

>>21842711
It always irritates me that people won't speak plainly about ancient Greece. Just say thAe parthenon was the fucking treasury. Fucking christ.

>>21843060
Just call it the high city nerd

>>21843037
Op here. Read his illiad, and found it incredibly dry. Enjoyed Fagles much more

Is chapmans Homer worth reading? Looking for something to read besides Fagles and want an older translation

>>21843210
Just try it, faggot. It's free online. are you asking /lit/ for permission or what?

>>21843221
Yes

>>21843221
Is there a version with updated English spelling like the 1760s update to the KJV Bible

>>21843277
What are you, a woman? You want me to get you a sippy cup too?

>>21843302
Anon I asked a simple question

>>21843277
Try Wordsworth classics.

>>21843344
Thank you anon

>>21842872
Murray kicks butt

>Final boss: Pope
>Secret Boss: Hobbes

>>21843546
>Hobbes
He can't write for shit.

Lol, Fagles, more like FAGGOTS AMIRITEFOLKSISTERS

>>21843629
I had a premonition of this post. It probably doesn't mean anything, but just in case, thought you should know.

>>21842711
Learn Greek, read the original. If you spent an hour a day, you could be competent in a year or two. After that, if you want life and poetry in a translation, read Stanley Lombardo's version. The attempts at "faithful" English adaptations are futile.

>>21844237
>Spend an hour each day for a whole year to learn a language for the sole purpose of reading one book

You really are fucking autistic if you think I'm doing that. Should I do the same for russian to appreciate Dostoevsky? Do I have to learn 7 or 8 languages just to be able to read a few books?

>>21844403
don't take lazy bait you fool

>>21844432

>>21842845
The foreword spoils the plots. Go with Hamilton.

>Around the smoothwalled cave a crooking vine held purple clusters under ply of green
>and four springs, bubbling up near one another shallow and clear
Man why do I remember this shit so vividly it's been like 20 years since I read that. Something weird and primordial about this poem

>>21845504
Because it's beautiful nigga

>>21843546
>Hobbes has given us a correct explanation of the sense in general; but for particulars and circumstances he continually lops them, and often omits the most beautiful. As for its being esteemed a close translation, I doubt not many have been led into that error by the shortness of it, which proceeds not from his following the original line by line, but from the contractions above mentioned. He sometimes omits whole similes and sentences; and is now and then guilty of mistakes, into which no writer of his learning could have fallen, but through carelessness. His poetry, as well as Ogilby's, is too mean for criticism.

t.Pope

what's the takeaway from odyssey anyway

>>21846725
>honor the gods
>be skillful, strong and clever
>honor your wife and straight up murder any nigger who even rests their eyes on her for too long
I think the message is just "be a chad" but I also think people don't really read it for the message

>>21846755
That was my takeaway as well

>>21846725
I always seen it as a sort of force giving way to cunning. The Iliad showcased heroism and how it could be almost foolish. I see the Odyssey as a sort of tribute to the more pragmatic hero, or being pragmatic over foolish heroism. Odysseus survived the war and won the war for the Achaens and relied on his cunning and pragmatism to do so. I wouldn't go as far as it showing a changing of the guard from heroic battles and death and glory heroes to more intellectual heroes though. Also this >>21846755

>>21846755
what about him basically chilling as a guest in other people's kingdom for months and years every time and collecting gibs

>>21846952
Shows that trusting your neighbour and kindness is good :)

>>21842845
>"spoil" some plots
kek it's ancient history/mythology
Jesus is the redeemer, Achilles gets shot in the Achilles' heel, Caesar crosses the Rubicon, Leibniz invents calculus, and the holocaust didn't happen.

>>21846952
Showcasing the benefits of being a chad. And reminding the listener how to be a good Greek. Remember this wasn't just a poem to these people, it was a major cultural artifact.

>>21843037
Yes I’ve read it, I have a penguin edition from 1950. I don’t really remember much about its quality though because I was pretty young when I read it. But from the excerpts I’ve read recently it seems to be pretty good. I definitely think people underestimate the value of prose translations.

>>21846969
Dangerously based

>>21843210
Try Pope's translation.

>>21848346
Why Pope over chapman if I may ask?

>>21842869
>>21846969
We aren't born with ancient mythology knowledge in our DNA. Imagine an infant growing up and deciding to read ancient literature. Stop trying so hard.

>>21842994
This, his quoted and Kline are the worthwhile ones.

Fagles is good for the casual reader, but if you truly want Odyssey, Iliad and Aeneid raw, then Kline is usually the best bet.

P.S: I read the Latin text for the Aeneid, so I can personally attest to Kline's accuracy in translation.

I'm, reading T.E. Shaw's prose translation. How big a crime is it?

>>21850381
Unforgivable unfortunately

>>21848862
>he read history for the plot.
...and I thought fiction plotfags were bad.

Fagles really does it for me. But Fitzgerald has the best Aeneid.

>>21847255
I agree, the prose is always slated as the babby version but honestly I think it's a solid edition for even scholars.

>>21850534
Has anyone read West's Aeniad? Was about to start it but want to know if it's shit or not

>>21850534
Ahl’s Aeneid is the best by far

>>21842711
I’m starting to think it’ll be easier to just learn ancient greek than engage in these kinds of debates. I already started on latin so might as well.

>>21850932
>he doesn't want to endlessly argue over the best translation
Loser

>>21842872
Chapman
>‘Urge not my death to me, nor rub that wound,
>I rather wish to live in earth a swain,
>Or serve a swain for hire, that scarce can gain
>Bread to sustain him, than, that life once gone,
>Of all the dead sway the imperial throne.
>But say, and of my son some comfort yield,
>If he goes on in first fights of the field,
>Or lurks for safety in the obscure rear?
>Or of my father if thy royal ear
>Hath been advertis’d, that the Phthian throne
>He still commands, as greatest Myrmidon?
>Or that the Phthian and Thessalian rage
>(Now feet and hands are in the hold of age)
>Despise his empire?
Pope (Actually translated by William Broome)
>“‘Talk not of ruling in this dolorous gloom,
>Nor think vain words (he cried) can ease my doom.
>Rather I’d choose laboriously to bear
>A weight of woes, and breathe the vital air,
>A slave to some poor hind that toils for bread,
>Than reign the sceptred monarch of the dead.
>But say, if in my steps my son proceeds,
>And emulates his godlike father’s deeds?
>If at the clash of arms, and shout of foes,
>Swells his bold heart, his bosom nobly glows?
>Say if my sire, the reverend Peleus, reigns,
>Great in his Phthia, and his throne maintains;
>Or, weak and old, my youthful arm demands,
>To fix the sceptre steadfast in his hands?

>>21851253
I genuinely cannot tell if I want to read one of these 2 or just re read fagles again
Fagles clearly strips stuff down

>>21851253
If there was a translation in Spenserian stanza, it would be the most kino thing imaginable.

>>21851272
Possibly Chapman and 'Pope' were ornamenting and adding things that were not there in the original, in order to fit the metre.

>>21846969
>be Achilles
>get shot (in the heel)

>>21851283
I wrote this for you, working off the various translation (I don't know Greek)
>In praise of death, Ulysses, not a word.
>I would instead be a poor farmer's slave,
>And live above, than be below the lord
>Of all the dead men here beyond the grave.
>But tell me of my son, this news I crave.
>Is he a soldier bold, and wars engage?
>Does Peleus King of Myrmidons behave?
>Or men of Greece and Phthia at him rage,
>Now that my father's old, his limps succumbed to age?

>>21851386
Not him but I enjoyed this a lot only one problem:
>Ulysses

>>21851386
Oops, should be limbs in the last line.
>>21851402
Change the first line to
>In praise of death, Odysseus, no word.
I prefer Ulysses because that's what Joyce titled his novel.

>>21851386
So based. Imagine the whole poem like this.

>>21842711
I prefer DeShawns translation.

>>21842711
>The odissey
>Minoan painting
What

>>21851732
I tried my hand at the opening.
>The man, O Muse, of many methods, sing,
>Who wandered far, when after did deploy
>Himself at Ilium and destruction bring
>Upon the holy, blesséd town of Troy.
>And of the various cities did enjoy,
>The countless nations when he sailed around
>The sea, the many manners they employ,
>Their cultures and their customs he had found,
>For all the world he saw, when he sailed homeward bound.
>
>Moreover, sing of all his sufferings
>When he was struggling to reach home again
>With his own life, yet tried he many things,
>He could not save the lives of all his men.
>They perished, herefore they had foolish been
>When they did eat and in their stomachs churn
>The sacred Oxen of the Sun, so then
>Hyperion prevented their return.
>Jove's daughter, too sing these, however thou didst learn.
I don't think the Spenserian Stanza is suited for Homer because his poem isn't easily dividable into chunks of nine lines. For the first stanza, I had to really expand so to fit the metre. The best metre, in my opinion, would be the Heroic Couplet of Chapman.

I love Fagles so much fellas, mogs all other translations IMO.

Uhhm....Pope

>>21842845
yes especially if you dont know a thing about the mythology

If you're going to go on about translations just read Peter Greens translation for accuracy.
If you care about jerking off to the content fagles is alright. If you want to read a translation completely worthless for deeper study but has the plot. Pope and Chapman are ok.

>>21849329
Ahl’s translation of the Aeneid is very good

>>21854381
>If you want to read a translation completely worthless for deeper study but has the plot. Pope and Chapman are ok.
Why are theirs worthless for deeper study

>>21842711
ive read Butler and Fagles. What would you recommend for Iliad and Odyssey?

>>21842812
How the fuck do you consider
>king of all the dead
jazzed up compared to
>lord over all of the phantoms of those who have perished

>>21855148
The second is literal, the first is jazzed up. If you did a jazz-version of Beethoven’s 5th, yeah yeah, snapping your fingers etc, it will absolutely be shorter than the actual symphony. Jazzing can theoretically makes something longer but typically it runs either the same length or gets truncated

>>21855161
I should also add that the literal version here actually aims for English dactylic hexameter as well, so not only are the words a closer approximation, but the rhythm is as well

>>21855148
The second is an almost word-for-word literal translation of Homer's words. Compare it with Lattimore's also quite accurate translation (though I think Merrill's seems to be slightly more accurate)
>“O shining Odysseus, never try to console me for dying.
>I would rather follow the plow as thrall to another
>man, one with no land allotted him and not much to live on,
>than be a king over all the perished dead. But come now,
>tell me anything you have heard of my proud son, whether
>or not he went along to war to fight as a champion;
>and tell me anything you have heard about stately Peleus,
>whether he still keeps his position among the Myrmidon
>hordes, or whether in Hellas and Phthia they have diminished his state,
>because old age constrains his hands and feet, and I am no longer there
>under the light of the sun to help him
Lots of translators change it so much that it could hardly be called homer.

>>21854811
NTA but they deform the text in many ways. They adapt it to verses that don't really resemble Homer's (shorter, with rhymes which restrict the translator), they usually have to abandon his elements of oral singing, even the names in Pope's translation are not Greek but Latin (Jupiter, etc.). Chapman I haven't read much but supposedly he also inserts additional moral judgments into the narration, while one passage of Pope's Odyssey that I compared with the original turned out to have one or two verses of completely made-up content (nature description). Or he translated from a less reliable manuscript, which would be a better option regarding his accuracy than if he just made it up, but either way it's not a good way to approach Homer himself.

>>21846725
That in ancient Greek lore, cunning and wisdom wins over brute strength. Read Socrates' literary analysis of the story in Hippias Minor.
>>21846755
Odysseus is something even more than a "chad" as you put it. Achilles was a chad and his vain death pails next to Odysseus.

>>21846952
Well with Circe it was more like only a few hours but to the outside world it was years.

>>21855728
what is this interstellar

>Now, as they talked on, a dog that lay there
lifted up his muzzle, pricked his ears . . .
319 It was Argos, long-enduring Odysseus’ dog
320 he trained as a puppy once, but little joy he got
since all too soon he shipped to sacred Troy.
In the old days young hunters loved to set him
coursing after the wild goats and deer and hares.
But now with his master gone he lay there, castaway,
on piles of dung from mules and cattle, heaps collecting
out before the gates till Odysseus’ serving-men
could cart it off to manure the king’s estates.
Infested with ticks, half-dead from neglect,
here lay the hound, old Argos.
330 But the moment he sensed Odysseus standing by
he thumped his tail, nuzzling low, and his ears dropped,
though he had no strength to drag himself an inch
toward his master. Odysseus glanced to the side
and flicked away a tear, hiding it from Eumaeus,
diverting his friend in a hasty, offhand way:
“Strange, Eumaeus, look, a dog like this,
lying here on a dung-hill . . .
what handsome lines! But I can’t say for sure
if he had the running speed to match his looks
340 or he was only the sort that gentry spoil at table,
show-dogs masters pamper for their points.”
You told the stranger, Eumaeus, loyal swineherd,
“Here —it’s all too true —here’s the dog of a man
who died in foreign parts. But if he had now
the form and flair he had in his glory days —
as Odysseus left him, sailing off to Troy —
you’d be amazed to see such speed, such strength.
No quarry he chased in the deepest, darkest woods
could ever slip this hound. A champion tracker too!
350 Ah, but he’s run out of luck now, poor fellow . . .
his master’s dead and gone, so far from home,
and the heartless women tend him not at all. Slaves,
with their lords no longer there to crack the whip,
lose all zest to perform their duties well. Zeus,
the Old Thunderer, robs a man of half his virtue
the day the yoke clamps down around his neck.”
With that he entered the well-constructed palace,
strode through the halls and joined the proud suitors.
But the dark shadow of death closed down on Argos’ eyes
360 the instant he saw Odysseus, twenty years away.

>>21842711
got nothing to do with being a woman
have sex

>>21846952
He doesn't. He spends years with Calypso and only a few days or weeks or whatever with Nausicaa's family, whose entire civilization get screwed over for helping him when Poseidon raises mountains from the sea.

>>21851996
The Wilson version of the opening is really good though.

>>21857369
The Odyssey was written by a woman. Sam Butler says so.

My favourite translation of the Odyssey, Fitzgerald:

Let me hear no smooth talk
of death from you, Odysseus, light of councils.
Better, I say, to break sod as a farm hand
for some poor country man, on iron rations,
than lord it over all the exhausted dead.
Tell me, what news of the prince my son: did he
come after me to make a name in battle
or could it be he did not? Do you know
if rank and honor still belong to Peleus
in the towns of the Myrmidons? Or now, may be,
Hellas and Phthia spurn him, seeing old age
fetters him, hand and foot.

>>21857369
Keep seething

>>21856995
just read this yesterday. It's amazing the talent some writers have to make the most basic language carry so much emotion