Greek vase with muse

TRANSLATION 
WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE?       

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  Greek man
       THE ILIAD (Page 2)


Now that you've seen two examples of how the opening lines of The Iliad have been translated, let's consider some of the reasons why translators make different choices. For a translator, there are three main considerations: accuracy, sense, and sound. 

ACCURACY means following the original writing as closely as possible and not changing the original meaning. To illustrate what's involved in this, you'll see below a transcription of the way in which the Iliad was originally written. (I have, however, used the English-language alphabet rather than the ancient Greek and have omitted accent marks that aren't easily duplicated on a computer.) The box on the right has my literal (word-for-word) translation of the original text.

menin aeide thea Peleiadeo Achileos

oulomenen, he muri' Achaiois alge' etheke,

pollas d' iphthimous psuchas Aidi proiapsen
heroon, authous de heloria teuche kunessin
oionoisi te pasi, Dios d' eteleito boule... 		the wrath sing goddess of Peleus' son
     Achilles
destructive, that great numbers of Achaeans 
      had pain put upon them,
many strong breaths to Hades were sent
[of] warriors, them he made as prey to dogs
and to all birds, Zeus accomplished  his
      will....

Now let's look again at the translations by Robert Fagles and Richmond Lattimore that were on the previous page. As you read through them again in the boxes below, compare them with the literal translation that I've given above.

     TRANSLATION A: FAGLES

Rage -- Goddess, sing the rage of Peleus'
     son Achilles,
murderous, doomed, that cost the Achaeans
    countless losses,
hurling down to the House of Death so many
     sturdy souls,
great fighters' souls, but made their  bodies
    carrion,
feasts for the dogs and birds,
and the will of Zeus was moving toward its
     end.

    TRANSLATION B: LATTIMORE

Sing, goddess, the anger of Peleus' son
     Achilleus
and its devastation, which put pains 
     thousand-fold upon the Achaians,
hurled in their multitudes to the house of
    Hades strong souls
of heroes, but gave their bodies to be the
    delicate feasting
of dogs, of birds, and the will of Zeus was
    accomplished....

The following exercise will help you to analyze these differences.

EXERCISE B
 In the left-hand box below, you'll find five groups of words that have been copied from the literal translation printed at the top of this page. Your goal in this exercise is to see how the same ideas were expressed, in different words, in the other two translations on this page: Translation A by Robert Fagles and Translation B by Richmond Lattimore. Click on the links to go back to these translations. 
I've done the first one for you so you can see how it should be done. 

LITERAL TRANS. A: FAGLES TRANS. B: LATTIMORE

the wrath sing goddess

Rage -- Goddess, sing
   the rage		 Sing, goddess, the anger

destructive

   

great numbers of Achaeans
    had pain put upon them

   

many strong breaths to
   Hades were sent [of]
   warriors

    

Zeus accomplished his will

   

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Now proceed to Page 3.

 

comments to: vpoulakis@nvcc.edu

06/02/05