Quote:
Originally Posted by LovesMacs
Depends on what you find easier. If you find prose easier to read than verse, Penguin Classics publishes a decades-old translation by E.V. Rieu.
The translation I have read is by Robert Fagles. It's in verse and has many footnotes.
I also bought but haven't yet read the Lattimore translation. I've read that it shows as much fidelity to Greek as is possible with the English language. I know that it uses spellings that you may not be accustomed to (Menelaos for Menelaus, Aias for Ajax) because many English translations use spellings that have been influenced by Latin.
I've flipped through a contemporary translation by Stanley Lombardo. It's very visceral and even slangy.
Here are a couple of Mobileread threads that also discuss translations:
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=185961
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=175779 |
You could look at George Chapman's translation. Here's a recommendation from John Keats :
"Much have I travell'd in the realms of gold,
And many goodly states and kingdoms seen;
Round many western islands have I been
Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold.
Oft of one wide expanse had I been told
That deep-browed Homer ruled as his demesne;
Yet did I never breathe its pure serene
Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold"