Get told to 'start with the Greeks'

>actually starting with the Greeks

Butler is good. Revised Rieu is even more straightforward, if you feel you need that.

You can appreciate and understand the themes of the Iliad even if you do not know anything about Greek gods and heroes at all, for by the end of it you will have learned enough.

Honestly yes give up on highbrow stuff unless you skipped to the Iliad without reading any of the background literature, it's not a difficult book remotely, it's the greek equivalent of YA fiction.

You could just stick to contemporary YA fiction but I mean that book just really isn't very hard. I don't know what to tell you OP. Maybe read something like Hamiltons Mythology and tackle it again if you want another go at it, but it's really not too difficult of a book. The worst part of it is when they list off who literally everybody in the battle was and their trim black ships.

You could also just try another translation.

I would also suggest trying to read the Iliad OUT LOUD.

What people don't get in this discussion is that the issue isn't whether or not the Iliad is hard. The Iliad is an easy book. The action is easy to follow, especially if you're reading Fagle, and you won't get stumped trying to understand anything.

But the issue isn't CHALLENGE, the issue is ACCESSIBILITY. The Iliad is not accessible, no matter the translation. Accessibility is the gap the reader has to bridge in order to connect with a work. If a book is about ancient greeks and ancient greek gods, it doesn't matter how strong the characterization is, or how compelling the action is, or how straightforward the writing is. Because the setting and culture are so unfamiliar to the reader, the mere act of getting into the right mindset to enjoy the work can be overwhelming.

If you want to get people into reading, recommend something simple, contemporary, and domestic. Ease the accessibility gap. Later, widen it by offering more challenging works, and then foreign works, and then classic works.

this should be the new "start with the greeks".

somebody knows a good german version of the epic of gilgamesh?

yep you need to be familiar with greek culture otherwise reading the iliad is just a waste of time
I mean just look at the first few sentences;

>The wrath sing, goddess, of Peleus' son, Achilles, that destructive wrath which brought countless woes upon the Achaeans, and sent forth to Hades many valiant souls of heroes, and made them themselves spoil for dogs and every bird; thus the plan of Zeus came to fulfillment, [5] from the time when1 first they parted in strife Atreus' son, king of men, and brilliant Achilles. Who then of the gods was it that brought these two together to contend? The son of Leto and Zeus; for he in anger against the king roused throughout the host an evil pestilence, and the people began to perish, [10] because upon the priest Chryses the son of Atreus had wrought dishonour

you need to know that Homer is calling onto the Muse first
you need to know that Achaeans = the greeks
you need to know what Hades is
you need to know that Atreus' son = Agamemnon (king of the greeks)
you need to know that the son of Leto and Zeus is Apollo

so OP go read up on some greek mythology and then try again

I started with the Greek but honestly I didn't get it. I read the Odyssey. How come at the end when the guy comes back he kills all the suitors in the most pussy way possible. Disarms and slaughters them all, then all the girls too. They thought he was dead, so what's the big idea. Is it because they disrespected his dog?

Homer was a retard user, it's as simple as that

All of that is in the fucking footnotes, you humongous waste of oxygen.

How can you be so stupid?

Did anyone else get the feeling homer was trying to lay ground work for a archetypical hero? It feels like homer tool the first steps in the attempt to create the perfect greek hero.

The Iliad was boring, so I just read enough about it to understand references to it in other works.

Sounds like you don't know either.

No shit

They conspired to kill his son and were wasting away his resources and impinging on the hospitality of his household as a way of forcing Penelope to remarry. Sure, there were probably a couple of them that weren't assholes, but the overwhelming majority were.

Why would he not disarm them? It was 4 against 70. He only killed the women who had been disloyal to his household.

WOAH NICE INSIGHT BRO

something something circle of violence something something trojan war, god how can people be so dense, maybe read the iliad first?

sry I don't read with footnotes you humongous pleb

I think you meant "because I am a", not "you".

Just read the odyssey. Ignore the Iliad.

Don't just pick up the Iliad! Get some background first, man. That epic was recounted to an audience generally familiar with the characters that feature in it. Start with a basic book on mythology. I'm serious. Even the illustrated children's books. Many of them are good. That's where I began. You'll soon grasp the groove and tone of ancient Grecian legend, slowly familiarize yourself with the figures and features - gaining a wider understanding of it all. Then you'll be able to enter the halls of Homer. It's damn well worth it.

I don't get it either. When I start reading most Greek philosophy or stories, the language seems confusing to me. When I read it, it's like they are just a bunch of vague sentences without really solid meanings, and it takes them 5 paragraphs to say what could be said in 1-2 statements. It's pretty strange to me. I often feel like I have to gloss over entire paragraphs because I am reading nothing of substance.

You can google all the names you don't know of -_- no need to read hamilton's gay book :2

Fuck the memers. Start with something simple and work your way up. I think you need to actually enjoy the act of reading first before you can gain anything from it.

this

You should only study Virgil

pages.ucsd.edu/~dkjordan/arch/iliad/IliadGuide00.html

Read this, OP.

This.
Edith Hamilton's Mythology is one of the best out there.

which translation? poetry or prose?
if you started out with poetry like lattimore then I'd assume most of it would go over your head if you don't kmow the basics of greek mythology

>hamilton
>hammond
>lattimore
that order should be more than enough to get a grasp but if you started with poetry just get lost in the hexameter cause it's beautiful to read aloud

>not reading Fagles

This

Fuck you. If you can read the posts on this imageboard, you can read the Iliad. Reading Dan Brown or some other fecal genre fiction isn't going to give you additional preparation for anything.

The Iliad isn't a complicated book. It just takes a little bit of time to get used to the prose and development of the scenes.

Not only is the Iliad a primary source for our understanding of Greek mythology, it was a primary source for the Greeks as well (even if they had been well versed in it already). It's far from necessary or essential to read up on the mythology. Homer is descriptive enough to give you an understanding of what the gods are like and why they play roles that they do. The additional "Goddess X is the daughter of God Y" and "God A previously betrayed God B" type of stuff is extraneous to the Iliad
Though the mythology is cool and genuinely worth reading at some point, just not as a precursor to the Iliad or (especially not) the Odyssey

pleb

I will just add that I wrote this post assuming you have greater than zero knowledge of greek mythology

what is the DEAL with edith hamilton and this "background" gibberish lol. it's a good book but geez let a man fish for himself. no wonder nobody on this tundra of a board knows how to read a book properly.

>-_-
>:2
This is the person you want to take advice from?

What's with Fagles?

What's wrong* with Fagles?

how's fagles compare to lattimore?

It might be just adhd. You need stamina to read longer stuff. I suggest you read more short stories, I'm a brainlet and Franz Kafka's the metamorphosis was the first 'Veeky Forums approved book(please don't kill me)' that I actually really enjoyed despite not being very well read. If you didn't grow up reading it's a struggle to get through anything that's not the diary of a wimpy kid.

Easier to read, but less poetic.

Not true
My butler translation had the lists

Anyone caught reading an abridged """book""" should be shot

>not Chapman like a true patrician

What if I just want to know enough of the Greeks to have a foundation for understanding the western cannon but don't particularly want to focus on the Greeks themselves?

When anybody tells you to start with the Greeks, they're referring to pederasty, not literature.

I feel like the first thing you should read is an encyclopedia of Greek Mythology
And then you should read the Iliad and odyssey and so on

>plebs always complain about the catalogue of ships
>no one complains about the shield

I can only assume they didn't get that far. If you really can't deal with a book maybe being a boring for a chapter or two, reading is not for you.

It's a meme ya dip

I just started The Iliad today, user. It's not very hard to follow, just take your time. You don't have to rush things when reading. If you're struggling with it, nobody says you need to give up on reading, but maybe practice with the Veeky Forums starter kit to get yourself into a more practical reading routine as well as expanding your basic vocabulary. Then maybe try The Iliad.

I was a little worried that the prose edition might not be so good when I accidentally got a prose copy of The Odyssey. I believe it is Butler.

duhhhhhhhh thank u massa, neva unnastood that ililyad n i thot it wer ritten by hombre simson wrow

Don't know why people are saying this throughout the thread. The Iliad is pretty easy to follow thematically and it basically spells it out for the readers too dumb to understand any mythology.

>starting with the Illiad
>not starting with hieroglyphic on egyptian pottery

Yeah its weird that The Iliad, one of the most widely read books of all time, has some ideas in it that were used by later authors.
Really makes you think.

People who are coming into this whole reading thing starting with "tough stuff" make me laugh like theres millions of books out there start something your interested in first!!!

It's okay user, you just need to power through. I didn't feel like I appreciated the Illiad the first time through, now it's one of my favorite books. How are you going to improve if you don't read books above your intellectual level? You need to reach up above your level and pull yourself up, there's no other way.

> reading the Iliad
Its a shit book, why even bother?

Nothing but if you are op you should read his translation.

Fitzgerald is also a very solid prose translation. I think it's the most literal in terms of preserving the repeated epithets and other structural elements, in terms of prose translations. Plus, un-anglicised names a best.

You mean Nestor's autism rant to Patroklus? I loved the catalogue of ships but fuuuuuuck that garbage, literal anime filler tier.

everybody is acting like this is obvious, but i don't think it's even true. he surely wasn't "trying" to do anything; he just did it, like any good writer. nobody worth their ink writes with that kind of self-conciousness, and the greeks certainly didn't think in those modes. people on this board can't even give a close read to a Veeky Forums post.