Why does everyone hate Fagle's translations of the Illiad and Odyssey? Is the hate for him just a meme or something? I read Lattimore, and I read Fagles, and I found that Fagles was consistently more enjoyable. Sure, Lattimore may be more dead-accurate, but I think that Fagles actually captures the spirit of the poem better, and captures Homer's style better. Fagles poem is incredibly rapid and brisk, moves with a steady past and keeps you going along, very easily and naturally. With Lattimroe I found I kept getting hung up on the lines and going back to get their full meaning. I feel like Homer's poems were meant to be read in a very natural, brisk, almost simply sense, which Fagles captures perfectly. His rendering is simply the most powerful so I don't understand all the hate. Is he really not respected at all among the "serious" readership?
Why does everyone hate Fagle's translations of the Illiad and Odyssey? Is the hate for him just a meme or something...
fagles is the best translation. the only people that dislike it are bitter scholars (whose opinions are worthless because they're stupid enough to become scholars) and virgins on Veeky Forums with superior complexes.
Fagles is hated by those who resent literature being made more accessible to the masses. It has nothing to do with the quality of the work.
It's "smoothness" is a bad thing. It reads like prose with contemporary word choice. A horrendous translation made for people who "don't get" classics. There's a reason it isn't used in Academia. Pope is by far the greatest interpretation. Lattimore is the most accurate, but for translating ancient poetry that isn't always a good thing. Pope created a work of art that has become a great work of the English language.
Run along back to the genre fiction thread, this is a literary discussion.
Yes, Pope is the modern academician's translation of choice. Lol.
>this is a literary discussion.
Redditspacing is prohibited in real literary discussion syntax. You're a poseur
>made for people who "don't get" classics
And there it is. The classics are a gnostic endeavor which only the privileged few may understand. What must one "get"? You'll never know!
>literature being made more accessible to the masses.
>It has nothing to do with the quality of the work.
Whew. Do you even think about what you write? You just explained how it is lesser quality. A work has to be dumbed down in order to become palpable to the masses.
Who's saying that? You?
>What must one "get"? You'll never know!
You certainly won't if you even have to ask
>A work has to be dumbed down in order to become palpable to the masses.
Or it can be liberated from obscurantism.
>You certainly won't if you even have to ask
Of course. We can't have too many people possessing our secret knowledge.
you really can't claim to be "academic" if you are reading Homer in translation.
stop berating others, you're just embarrassing yourself.
You're all over the place, just stop. That's the point, what makes Pope great is that it doesn't try to be a translation. Same with Dryden
No one in this thread has said anything bad about Pope's translation. You're swinging at nothing.
I am addressing those who think Fagle's is the best. He gets memed hard here and it is pretty pathetic to see him recommended unopposed on what is supposed to be a literature board. Must be the same people who unironically liked IJ.
>It's "smoothness" is a bad thing. It reads like prose with contemporary word choice
Sounds like homer desu
Dryden>Pope>"Homer"
Do you also demand that people not read modern translations of the Bible? Tell me you're not only an obscurantist when it comes to the classics. That would be rather arbitrary, don't you think?
Huh? If you are reading for literary merit then of course. KJV Bible is the most classic english classic
Are there other concerns which might influence one's choice of translation? I thought we were dismissing things like that. We're only talking about those of us who "get it", you know?
Pic related, did I fuck up?
>It was 60 cents, so if even if I did I don't mind
I bet that nobody above this post knows ancient Greek.
Also, op, if you've seen "everyone hate Fagle's translations" you should go to a psychiatrist. Hallucinations are a serious problem.
>Wordsworth
You probably fucked up. Who's the translator?
this
bitter virgin detected
Spacing between quoting (>>) is the standard here, faggot.
...
Fitzgerald is the best choice. Heroic couplets are for manchildren.
How the fuck has only one person mentioned Fitzgerald? Peter Green's translation of the Iliad is also great.
No man that's chapman I think, solid choice Keats liked him
Liked him so much he wrote a poem on Chapmans translation:
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:
Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
When a new planet swims into his ken;
Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes
He star’d at the Pacific — and all his men
Look’d at each other with a wild surmise —
Silent, upon a peak in Darien.
Anyway, its the edition I have and i love it
>There are unironically people on Veeky Forums defending Fagles
Man, this board has really gone to shit.