The Odyssey: The Fitzgerald Translation

The Trojan War is over and one of our hero kings is lost. His son (Telemachus) travels to find any information about his father's fait. His wife (Penelope) must cunningly hold off suitors that are eating them out of house and home.

If he ever makes it home, Odysseus will have to detect those servants loyal from those who are not. One absent king against rows of suitors; how will he give them their just deserts? We look to Bright Eyed Pallas Athena to help prophecy come true.

Interestingly all the tales of monsters and gods on the sea voyage was told by Odysseus. Notice that no one else survives to tell the tale. Therefore, we have to rely on Odysseus' word.

Many movies took sections of The Odyssey, and expanded them to make interesting stories those selves.

Not just the story but also the way in which it is told will keep you up late at night reading.


The Odyssey

Well, I'm not a Greek or Classics major. The writing program I work for assigns this edition. Now, although with a work of this bulk I feel bad complaining, but I am sure that several Greek scholars will feel much unease with Fitzgerald's translation. Why? Because it is almost too readable. A vast abyss of history opens between us and Greek Antiquity, but if you read this translation, you want to slap Odysseus on the shoulder and have a glass of wine with him. I am torn, because I love the emotional responsiveness F. creates in me, but the student of Old English is sceptical of whether this approach is really a good idea. The obvious bonus is that (disinterested) students will complain less about their assigned reading, and teaching will mean less "what he is saying here is..."-stuff. Still, I have my reservations (many of which are addressed in the foreword and afterword, as well as in the notes on the translation) against making it too easy and enabling the student to ignore the cultural difference.

That said, if you have no classical training, no interest in academic translations, and just want to read the darn thing for once, then I HIGHLY recommend this edition!

The Odyssey will always be a classic of literature, and with good reason. With the intense battles, Odysseus's clever tricks, and Penelope and Telemachus's heart-wrenching plight, it's no wonder this poem has survived the centuries. This version goes above and beyond what should be required of a translation: the prose is beautiful and arranged, as it should be, in lines and stanzas. Hermes rhymes and Homer's memory tricks work to enrich the text rather than detract. The cover, featuring a watercolor over a contour of Athena, is a nice addition, and looks nice on your shelf. In conclusion, I would reccommend this whole-heartedly and tell you that anyone who hasn't read the Robert Fitzgerald translation of the Odyssey hasn't read the Odyssey at all.

I here consider not the story of the Odyssey itself, accounts of which abound, but rather Robert Fitzgerald's 1961 translation. Unlike recent more literal translations of the Odyssey such as Richmond Lattimore's (1962) and Albert Cook's (1967), which seek to reflect the original Greek with strict fidelity, Fitzgerald's does not confine itself to mirroring the Homeric line in syntax or parts of speech. Instead, he renders the verse of the Odyssey--which in the Greek averages roughly sixteen syllables per line--into English lines of ten or eleven syllables. His shorter line of course results in lenthening each of the original's twenty-four books. In the Greek, Book I, for example, consists of 444 lines; in Fitzgerald's version, 500 lines. He translates the first two lines of Greek into five lines of English; here the single Greek word polytropon, "much-turned" or "of many ways," becomes the rather full phrase "skilled in all ways of contending." This syntactically loose approach, while inconveniencing those readers curious enough to compare his version against a Greek text, allows Fitzgerald to amplify the original where he sees fit (though by no means to the extent of early translators like George Chapman and Alexander Pope) and to display here and there a poetical flourish not contained in the original.

Fitzgerald's liberality with the line extends to his choices with character epithets. At times they drop out of his version altogether - and these omissions occasionally conceal the subtlety of the original poem's design - but more often than not he deals with a commonly repeated epithet by varying his phrases, which helps to show the manifold nature of the Greek adjectives but may also lead Greek-less readers to think the original more manifold than is actually the case. He renders Telemakhos' epithet pepnymenos in a variety as diverse as it is colloquial : "kept his head," "cool enough," "clear-headed," "with no confusion," "thoughtfully," "seeing all clear." (Lattimore, by contrast, dutifully translates the epithet as "thoughtful.") Penelope's epithet, periphron, which means "circumspect" or "all-considering," becomes, depending on the context, "quiet," "wise," "careful," "watchful," "prudent," and even "most worn in love and thought." And finally, to take only one of Odysseus' numerous epithets, Fitzgerald renders polymetis as "the great tactician," "that sly and guileful man," "his ranging mind," "who had it all timed in his head," "the master of many crafts," "the great master of invention," "the master improviser," "ready for this," "the master of subtle ways and straight." (Lattimore more literally translates it as "resourceful.") While some readers may find such translational choices promiscuous, others will appreciate Fitzgerald's ability to showcase the many facets of Odysseus' character. Perhaps the best instance of this freedom comes at the start of Book 22 when, armed with his old bow, Odysseus finally discloses himself to the suitors: here Fitzgerald translates polymetis as "the wiliest fighter of the islands."

Readers seeking Homer's "pure serene," that is, an acquaintance with the unique concepts and syntax of Homeric Greek, may be frustrated by the loose relation of Fitzgerald's translation to the original. But those for whom the literalness of Lattimore is overly wooden may find themselves arrested by the vividness of Fitzgerald's verse and the vivacity which he gives Homer's characters. Fitzgerald's liberal approach frees him to reflect in his lines the sorts of stunning interpretations that more literal approaches entrust to the sensitivity of readers. Most telling along these lines is his choice in the opening of Book 21, when Penelope decides to try the suitors by bringing out at last the bow of Odysseus. The Greek is, roughly, "then the grey-eyed goddess Athena put it in the mind of / the daughter of Ikarios, all-considering Penelope. . . ." These lines Fitzgerald transmutes into "upon Penelope, most worn in love and thought, / Athena cast a glance like a grey sea / lifting her." As readers, the question is how high the translator must lift us in order for us to deepen our appreciation of the Odyssey; perhaps for some of us, Fitzgerald's alchemy will indeed provide the vessel which rides the utmost crest of the wave, bringing us within glimpse of that rare land which Keats wondered at above all other realms of gold.

I just read The Odyssey again for a literature class. Man, it was better than I remembered. I had read this back in high school in 1996 or 97, and at the time I didn't care for it all that much. However, I don't think it was the same translation. I don't know if that had anything to do with it, but this was a very enjoyable read. It has everything you could want in a heroic tale: monsters, gods, beautiful women, magic, and of course a trip into the underworld. Just make sure to look up characters while you read it. It really makes the text more enjoyable if you know who the various gods and demi-gods are.