“English Translators of Homer” by Simeon Underwood July 12, 2025 I must caveat the rest of my remarks by saying I believe the book I was looking for would be titled “English Translations of Homer” rather than “English Translators of Homer.” This book is a history of the translators, the choices they made in translation, and how they were influenced by previous translations and by the style and culture of their times. Whereas, what I was looking for would spend more time comparing the texts. That said, I think the author made a mistake by not illustrating more of his points with quotations from the texts. It gets frustrating to be told about Pope’s style, or Rieu’s choice of prose over verse, and go for pages without an example passage. I actually checked a version of Rieu out of the library while reading this book, so I could see what the author was talking about. Of course, that would be a longer book, but at 68 pages, this provides excessively short coverage of a large topic. At twice the length, it would still be a mere outline. With those remarks aside, this is a good book. It really clarified how to think about the various translations and what I am looking for when I read them. Underwood starts by saying every act of translation is a balance between preserving the source text and producing a readable and enjoyable target text. This is particularly challenging in the case of poetry, where the choice and organization of the words is as or more important than their meaning. In fact, it is easy to imagine that in some cases this task may be impossible: hypothetically, there may not exist the words in English to translate a Haiku while maintaining the 5-7-5 form. A particular challenge with Homer is that these texts are fundamental historic documents: not meaning they are histories, but rather that the texts appear at the very beginning of Western history. It is very reasonable to want to read them as close to the original Greek as possible to understand not only the events they describe (whatever their historical authenticity) but also the evolution of language and poetry, and to glimpse the mind and times of the author(s). On the other hand, Iliad and Odyssey are both enjoyable and interesting as stories, and it is reasonable to want to produce a text that emphasizes that. And here comes yet another challenge beyond even translating contemporary poetry. Is the text supposed to capture the experience of a reader (or listener) from ancient times by, for example, using ancient idioms and similes, or create an analogous mood in the modern reader by updating those constructs? For example, in Book 5, the hero Diomedes wounds Aphrodite. The love goddess retreats to Olympus, where she complains to Zeus. Lattimore’s translation goes: “Tydeus’ son Diomedes, the too high-hearted, stabbed me as I was carrying my own beloved son out of the fighting, Aineias, who beyond all else in the world is dear to me; so now this is no horrible war of Achaians and Trojans, but the Danaäns are beginning to fight even with the immortals.” Christopher Logue’s highly stylized and modernized version reads: Love: ‘Father, see this.’ (Her wrist.) ‘Human strikes god! Communism! The end of everything!’ The modern reader, who presumably does not honor the gods or understand the context of words like Achaians and Danaans, may feel something closer to the emotional intent of the poet in Logue’s version, even though the words themselves would make no sense to Homer. (The above illustrates a problem with this book, which is almost devoid of side-by-side comparisons to explain the author’s points. I had to find my own examples, which may or may not actually match Underwood’s intent.) I found the middle chapters of the book, focused on Chapman, Pope, and Rieu, quite dull for the reasons already mentioned (telling rather than showing the choices made by these translators). Fortunately, the final chapter is about Christopher Logue’s controversial “account” of the Iliad, “War Music.” Logue is literally not a translator, and does not claim to be. He worked from English rather than Greek texts: the language was translated for him. And he writes in a distinctly modern style, one that would be controversial and a matter of taste in any age, including today’s. Choosing Logue’s approach highlights the translation choices Underwood started this book with. Here’s Logue (as quoted by Underwood) talking about versions that emphasize the source text: I look at new translations as they come out, that of Professors Knox and Fagle, for example, which is a touch sharper than Professor Lattimore’s. However, these professors may have been reading Homer all their lives, but he’s failed to teach them what verse is. Ouch! Suddenly, Bernard Knox’s criticism of Logue in the London Review of Books (hilariously titled “Homeroidal”) makes sense: The generosity of the licence he grants himself was not reassuring, and his crude parodies of Homeric epithets suggested a certain contempt for his author’s diction Knox’s review goes on like that, mostly scathing, and is well worth reading, because for me, all his complaints and illustrations have precisely the opposite of his intended effect. The very examples Knox uses to show where Logue has gone wrong, to me, show exactly what Logue has done right (I’m serious, read Knox’s review, and tell me if it doesn’t make you want to read Logue). Knox comes off as a pedantic prude, as when replying to a letter about his review, he says: Pound, however, unlike Logue, did not mangle the structure of his original, introduce a host of new characters with outlandish names, and lay on faecal and sexual obscenities with a lavish hand. There are phrases in Pound’s poem that send the reader back to Propertius’ text with new insight and sometimes to find an unnoticed felicity – something that will not happen to the reader of Logue, who does not know the original and who is for at least 50 per cent of the time drawing freely on his own lurid imagination. I find it hard to believe anybody reads “War Music” without at least an acquaintance with the original. What Knox means, of course, is “the reader of Logue (and Logue), who does not know the original as well as I do!” The chapter on Logue also describes Lattimore’s approach to translation: “…the content of each line in the English corresponds to the content of each line in the Greek; in its way this is a remarkable achievement, but the line as translation unit, coupled to Lattimore’s scholarly approach, imposes great constraints on his scope…” Lattimore’s is my choice when I want a translation that is closest to the source material, and it’s a perfectly fine read, but I think Underwood’s analysis explains how you end up with undecipherable stuff like: (Lattimore): Meanwhile Apollo sprang out to meet them, so that he could fend off destruction from the Trojans, who, straight for the city and the lift of the rampart dusty from the plain and throats rugged with thirst, fled away, and Achilleus followed fiercely with the spear, strong madness forever holding his heart and violent after his glory. As Logue complains, this does not scan. Compare with Mitchell, who, like Logue, wrote from English sources, placing more emphasis on the poetry of the target text, though with a more traditional style: (Mitchell): And then Apollo rushed out to meet them and rescue them from destruction. They were running straight toward the city and its high wall in a cloud of dust, their throats all ragged with thirst, while Achilles chased them. A violent mad-dog rage gripped his heart, and he was intent on glory. Or, (Lattimore): …wish now Hektor had killed me, the greatest man grown in this place. A brave man would have been the slayer, as the slain was a brave man. But now this is a dismal death I am doomed to be caught in, trapped in a big river as if I were a boy and a swineherd swept away by a torrent when he tries to cross in a rainstorm.” Which is really hard to parse. vs (Stanley Lombardo): Better to be killed by Hector, Troy’s best, One good man killed by another. As it is, I am doomed to a wretched death, Caught in this river, like a swineherd boy Swept away while crossing a winter torrent Logue isn’t easy either, but wow!: Or Hector, my best enemy, call Hector for a big hit. Over Helen’s creditors, and I’ll go brave. Or else my death is waste. Trapped like a pig-boy beneath dirty water I’ll take Mitchell or Lombardo every day, and then read Logue afterwards. Alan Moore, talks about how strange juxtapositions of words, odd metaphors and phrasing, opens our mind and makes it more receptive to new meaning. Like Socrates leading his interlocutor to a feeling of cognitive dissonance (aporia) that opens the mind to new perspectives, I find Logue makes me think fundamentally differently about the source text, despite not being faithful to that text. As Underwood says: “…Logue is still seeking to convey what he sees as the poetic in Homer: and the risks he takes enable him to go further in this direction than the safer strategies of those he sees as his rivals.” Unfortunately, “English Translators of Homer” contains too few insights like this to make it a great book; instead, it is a fine book with some really good parts.