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/lit/ - Literature

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2704227 No.2704227 [Reply] [Original]

Heya /lit/. Quick question... Was wondering if anyone could tell me which version of The Odyssey is the best version to read?

>> No.2704229

Ulysses

>> No.2704235

>2012
>reading books

ISHYGDDT

>> No.2704238
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2704238

>>2704235

Reading may not be a part of your dharma, but that's ok.

>> No.2704257

http://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/homer/homertranslations.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_translations_of_Homer

This might help.

My advice is to read an easily comprehensible translation first, then storyboard it in your head so you make sure you got everything, THEN read a florid poetic version like Pope's. It's a lot easier than having to halt constantly in Pope and decipher something. The more poetic translations assume a certain level of familiarity with the classics, so you'll either need an annotated version or a lot of Googling to crack certain circumlocutions.

>> No.2704259

Someone will probably bite my head of for this, but I recommend E.V. Rieu's prose version. He gets in all the stock phrases and things that define Homer's writing, while just presenting the story in a generally more readable manner. Fagles is the best of the poetic translations, though.

>> No.2706655

>>2704227
Fagles' translations are usually the most accessible and IMO more powerful; this goes for Homer, Sophocles, Euripides, and Aeschylus.

Lattimore is more lyric and sometimes esoteric.

Those are the only two translators I've ever read of Ancient Greek tragedy and epics.

>> No.2706656

Just read the summary on wikipedia then watch a movie.

>> No.2706719

The T.E Lawrence (aka Lawrence of Arabia) translation was interesting although Im unsure of its exact accuracy