There was a moment when I was reading The Iliad that I thought to myself, “This is it. This is what the epic is really all about.” Somehow it all seemed to come down to one particular scene and all the rest was just leading up to it. Why I
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Scripturient: Homer’s Odyssey Revisited
Tell me, O muse, of that ingenious hero who travelled far and wide after he had sacked the famous town of Troy. Thus begins the 1897 translation by Samuel Butler of Homer’s Odyssey. It’s just one of more than 60 translations of the book into English since the first in
Continue readingScripturient: The New Odyssey
Much has been made of the fact that Emily Wilson’s recent translation of Homer’s The Odyssey (Norton, 2018) is the first translation of that great work by a woman. But for me what matters is how well she renders the text into modern English and makes what can be a
Continue readingScripturient: I Struggle With Milton
Confession time: I find a lot of epic or narrative poetry a slog. Milton, Homer, Dante… I have read my way into them all, but unlike my other books, I never get very far in any of them at each reading, although I make the effort and do so often.
Continue readingEclectic Lip: Homer (not Simpson) and the Kaopectate Kid
The doctor diagnosed young son Leo recently with the stomach flu — which is colloquial shorthand for a condition which isn’t the flu, per se. (The most recent editor of the relevant article on the almighty Wiki agrees!) The Kaopectate Kid Our medical professional then suggested we give Leo some
Continue readingFive of Five: Aristotle, Homer, Rembrandt and Joseph Heller
Aristotle Contemplating a Bust of Homer, Rembrandt van Rijn. (1653) Apparently Joseph Heller wrote his novel Picture This about this painting. The only Heller novel I haven’t read yet. Heller concludes that we don’t learn from history (and in fact so much of history may be nonfactual that learning may be
Continue readingFive of Five: Aristotle, Homer, Rembrandt and Joseph Heller
Aristotle Contemplating a Bust of Homer, Rembrandt van Rijn. (1653) Apparently Joseph Heller wrote his novel Picture This about this painting. The only Heller novel I haven’t read yet.
Heller conclude…
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