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Product Description
Product Description
This Wordsworth Edition includes an exclusive Introduction and Notes by Adam Roberts, Royal Holloway, University of London.
Homer's great epic describes the many adventures of Odysseus, Greek warrior, as he strives over many years to return to his home island of Ithaca after the Trojan War. His colourful adventures, his endurance, his love for his wife and son have the same power to move and inspire readers today as they did in Archaic Greece, 2800 years ago.
This poem has been translated many times over the years, but Chapman's sinewy, gorgeous rendering (1616) stands in a class of its own. Chapman believed himself inspired by the spirit of Homer himself, and matches the breadth and power of the original with a complex and stunning idiom of his own. John Keats expressed his admiration for the resulting work in the famous sonnet, 'On first looking into Chapman's Homer': 'Much have I travelled in the realms of gold...'
This new Wordsworth edition of Chapman's Homer contains accessible annotation, and a detailed introduction that places his masterpiece in the context of his own day, and discusses its influences on later poets.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
I first read the Odyssey in a prose translation and found it dull and dreary and difficult to wade through.
This translation (George Chapman's)is a rendering of the Odyssey into Elizebethan verse. This might well put you off and it is most likely far from the most accurate or upto date of translations. There are plenty of more accurate renderings (e.g. Lattimore) or more readable modern ones (Fagles, Fitzgerald, Lombardo).
But in this translation you see some of the rare beauty of what English can do at the time when some of the greatest works of English were produced. The verse is truly flowing and enjoyable; the edition is with the modernised spelling which helps but of course the odd word is a bit obscure. Nevertheless a complete joy to read provided you know in advance what you're getting into and I can only be grateful to Wordsworth Editions for producing this so cheaply for many to enjoy.
This translation (George Chapman's)is a rendering of the Odyssey into Elizebethan verse. This might well put you off and it is most likely far from the most accurate or upto date of translations. There are plenty of more accurate renderings (e.g. Lattimore) or more readable modern ones (Fagles, Fitzgerald, Lombardo).
But in this translation you see some of the rare beauty of what English can do at the time when some of the greatest works of English were produced. The verse is truly flowing and enjoyable; the edition is with the modernised spelling which helps but of course the odd word is a bit obscure. Nevertheless a complete joy to read provided you know in advance what you're getting into and I can only be grateful to Wordsworth Editions for producing this so cheaply for many to enjoy.
28 of 33 people found the following review helpful
I started reading this book already knowing the outline of Odessus's voyge back home after the battle of Troy through film, articles and reading a condensed version of the tale. I'm very glad I do have some fore-knowledge of the story as some parts of the book are quite ambiguous and confusing. The rich narrative of the text sometimes bogs the action down and it is quite easy to forget what exactly is happening.
The action though, when it comes, is exciting and often quite blood thirsty. The plot devices are also ingenious and completly ruthless in some cases- Odyssus is the only one of his party to arrive home after all his soldiers meet grusome deaths at the hands of his mortal enemies.
Possibly one of the most interesting things about the story is the way modern litrature and culture have frequently mirrored or refered to Homer's plot ideas (if you can say there's a plot, The Odyssey is written as a true story). The classic story of someone trying to return home against enormous odds has been used over and over often with subtle or not so subtle usage of Homer's myth. The images within the book of the sirens and the cyclopes are famous in their own right and it's amusing to see how they all fit into place in the larger scheme.
The split narrative of the story is very interesting as the tale of the journey home is sometimes told in hindsight or fore warning making the structure of the story jump. This seems very unusual in a book pre-twentieth century let alone cica 700BC!
Some parts of the book are repetative, steeped in unecessary narrative and are confusing. The regular descriptions of food and sacrifices to the gods can become dull and will not appeal to those who read for leisure, however, the antiquity of the writing means that The Odyssey is not only a story but also a piece of historic evidence showing how the ancient Greeks lived and what they believed.
As one of the earliest tales written it deserves a high place in anybody's to-read list. In a top 100 of the most important books ever written it would score very highly (top ten) and this is due to the historical rarity of writings of the time and also because it is an interesting, and in many places, exciting story. It is just a pity that the pace of the narrative often plods slowly along and is therefore quite difficult to get through at times.
The action though, when it comes, is exciting and often quite blood thirsty. The plot devices are also ingenious and completly ruthless in some cases- Odyssus is the only one of his party to arrive home after all his soldiers meet grusome deaths at the hands of his mortal enemies.
Possibly one of the most interesting things about the story is the way modern litrature and culture have frequently mirrored or refered to Homer's plot ideas (if you can say there's a plot, The Odyssey is written as a true story). The classic story of someone trying to return home against enormous odds has been used over and over often with subtle or not so subtle usage of Homer's myth. The images within the book of the sirens and the cyclopes are famous in their own right and it's amusing to see how they all fit into place in the larger scheme.
The split narrative of the story is very interesting as the tale of the journey home is sometimes told in hindsight or fore warning making the structure of the story jump. This seems very unusual in a book pre-twentieth century let alone cica 700BC!
Some parts of the book are repetative, steeped in unecessary narrative and are confusing. The regular descriptions of food and sacrifices to the gods can become dull and will not appeal to those who read for leisure, however, the antiquity of the writing means that The Odyssey is not only a story but also a piece of historic evidence showing how the ancient Greeks lived and what they believed.
As one of the earliest tales written it deserves a high place in anybody's to-read list. In a top 100 of the most important books ever written it would score very highly (top ten) and this is due to the historical rarity of writings of the time and also because it is an interesting, and in many places, exciting story. It is just a pity that the pace of the narrative often plods slowly along and is therefore quite difficult to get through at times.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Wonderful style, but firmly of it's period
This is a classic mid-Elizabethian translation of Homer's classic text. As a translation, Chapman's has become a critical version of itself, offering a wonderful example of... Read more
Published 13 months ago by theone00
Expectation!
I have purchased this in order to realise the similarities with the excellent film "Brother, where art thou" which claims to be based on the Odyssey. Read more
Published on 26 Sep 2000
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