Okay, I'm packing and painting like a maniac. Boy... So I am packing some books right now, and I found my copy of the Iliad.
This is the best translation. Let me tell you. I bought this copy in the Royal Museum in London. What better place, I thought. What a good souvenir. The British have long been mad about translating Greek classics.
So, I had this unread copy. I read a little bit after I bought it, but I didn't read too far until I had to take the classics class at my university. The teacher had a copy of the Iliad at the bookstore. I thought I would use the one I already.
Then, at a study group where we were getting ready for the quiz, I read a piece from my book. The other students dropped their jaws and said, "Whoa! That's not what my book says at all!"
THEIR translations were totally opaque. They all passed around my book and said I was lucky.
SO, if you want to read the Iliad like it was meant to be read, all exciting and interesting, get this translation. It's really great.
And the Iliad is a good book to read.
Article comments
1 - DrPat
There's the Iliad as story and the Iliad as poetry. Then there's the Iliad as pretentious, you-have-to-take-my-course to-understand-it, bull hockey. Sounds like your instructor chose a translation in the last group.
Hang on to that copy, Murphy - anything that can spark interest and reach across the gap of cultures and generations (an eons!) is worth having...
2 - Bob A. Booey
Best review EVER:
"the Iliad is a good book to read."
That is all.
3 - todd
thanks. i also really loved this prose translation. highly readable, very beautifully done. my favorite english version of the illiad.