Talk:English translations of Homer

Kline

This page is missing the awesome Kline translation.

Available online:

http://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/Greek/Iliad2.htm — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.97.26.98 (talk) 10:18, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Arrangement

Would this page not be better if translations were arranged according to year of publication, rather than alphabet? Subdivision into centuries would be useful too.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.46.15.162 (talk) 6 July 2009

I've made the table sortable and fixed a few errors. I have not converted the names to last-name-first order, which would obviously be best for sorting by translator name... - dcljr (talk) 07:58, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

And now I've started to add brief quotations from the various translations freely available online, for comparison purposes. - dcljr (talk) 10:31, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

OK, I finally put the translator names in last-first order and made the default sort order chronological by date of first publication. Now readers (with sufficiently modern browsers) can get 4 different sort orders: by date (default), by Iliad date (col. 2), by Odyssey date (col. 3), and by translator name (col. 1). - dcljr (talk) 04:57, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

The century subheadings caused the sort function not to work very well, so I contributed in its stead an index of translators, whose names redirect to matching entries in the table.--Hodgson-Burnett's Secret Garden (talk) 10:31, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Hmm

I hate to say this, given all the work HBSG has put into this article, but I'm not sure all the refactoring is actually an improvement here. The tables are now very "baroque" and rather distracting in appearance. If the tables are not going to be sortable (since they've been split by time period), there's really no need to give the names in last-first order, nor to split the information into quite so many columns. Instead of trying to explain what I mean in words, here's an example of how I would suggest simplifying the 16th–17th century table (using just one translator row for illustration purposes, and I've fixed a few problems — e.g., closing some unclosed tags and changing "background:#gray" to "background-color:gray"):

Current version: (begins with section heading containing only an {{anchor}})

Translations
Translator			Publishing details		Proemic verse	Link		Publishing details		Proemic verse	Link
16th and 17th centuries (1581 – c. 1700)
Chapman, George	1559–1634 dramatist, poet, classicist		1611–15	London, Rich. Field for Nathaniell Butter	Achilles' baneful wrath resound, O Goddess, that imposed / Infinite sorrows on the Greeks, and many brave souls losed / From breasts heroic…			1615	London, Rich. Field for Nathaniell Butter	The man, O Muse, inform, that many a way Wound with his wisdom to his wished stay; That wandered wondrous far, when he the town Of sacred Troy had sack'd and shivered down; The cities of a world of nations, With all their manners, minds, and fashions, He saw and knew; at sea felt many woes, Much care sustained, to save from overthrows Himself and friends in their retreat for home; But so their fates he could not overcome, Though much he thirsted it. O men unwise, They perish'd by their own impieties, That in their hunger's rapine would not shun The oxen of the lofty-going Sun, Who therefore from their eyes the day bereft Of safe return. These acts, in some part left, Tell us, as others, deified Seed of Jove.

Simpler version: ({{anchor}} in table caption)

Translations in the 16th and 17th centuries (1581 – c. 1700)

Translator	Publishing details, Iliad	Opening lines of Iliad	Publishing details, Odyssey	Opening lines of Odyssey
George Chapman (1559–1634) dramatist, poet, classicist	1611–15, London, Rich. Field for Nathaniell Butter	Achilles' baneful wrath resound, O Goddess, that imposed / Infinite sorrows on the Greeks, and many brave souls losed / From breasts heroic…	1615, London, Rich. Field for Nathaniell Butter	The man, O Muse, inform, that many a way Wound with his wisdom to his wished stay; That wandered wondrous far, when he the town Of sacred Troy had sack'd and shivered down; The cities of a world of nations, With all their manners, minds, and fashions, He saw and knew; at sea felt many woes, Much care sustained, to save from overthrows Himself and friends in their retreat for home; But so their fates he could not overcome, Though much he thirsted it. O men unwise, They perish'd by their own impieties, That in their hunger's rapine would not shun The oxen of the lofty-going Sun, Who therefore from their eyes the day bereft Of safe return. These acts, in some part left, Tell us, as others, deified Seed of Jove.

To my eyes, the second table is much easier to parse. And it might be worth making the tables sortable again if this simpler style is used (in which case, put the translator name back in last-first order). - dcljr (talk) 05:19, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

Great improvement. The first is one of the messiest tables I've ever seen.  Roger Davies ^talk 19:59, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

Looks good! Go for it!--Hodgdon's secret garden (talk) 16:39, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

References

What's in, what's out?

I know of two translations of THE ILIAD not yet included in these tables:

Verity, Anthony. 2011. Homer: The Iliad. Translated by Anthony Verity; with an introduction and notes by Barbara Graziosi. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199235483.

First line: Sing, goddess, the anger of Achilles, Peleus' son ...

Whitaker, Richard. 2012. The Iliad by Homer. A Southern African translation by Richard Whitaker. Cape Town: New Voices. ISBN 9781920411978.

First line: Muse, sing the rage of Peleus' son Akhilleus, ...

Could these be included in a future update of the list?

Because Alice Oswald seems to be the only female translator on the list, I have looked at her rendering more closely. Unless there is another rendition not yet showing up on Amazon.com, her version is entitled MEMORIAL: AN EXCAVATION OF THE ILIAD (2011) and I would like to question whether it belongs on this list. It is not a translation of the full text; in fact, in her foreword she states that she translated THE ILIAD's atmosphere, not its story. Her work is a long series of laments about the people who have died; she omits the rage of Achilles and other plot points. She was "aiming for translucence rather than translation"; in the process she has performed a "reckless dismissal of seven-eighths of the poem" in an attempt to demonstrate the adaptive nature of oral poetry. Striking and moving in its own right, redolent of Homeric lament and simile, no doubt. But an element on this list? No. I would like to see a full translation from a woman; therefore I hope that I'm missing another publication by Oswald!

Coenraad Walters (talk) 20:04, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

should include new translations of Barry B. Powell, THE ILIAD (2013) and THE ODYSSEY (2014) published by Oxford University Press wakan (talk) 23:38, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Iliad versus Odyssey

Is there any reason to compare Iliad's data against Odyssey's? 84.127.80.114 (talk) 20:57, 15 October 2014 (UTC)

If accessibility issues are meant to be solved, answering the previous question would help a future editor. 84.127.80.114 (talk) 01:44, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

we could probably split each table, which solve the extreme width issue. Frietjes (talk) 22:51, 24 October 2014 (UTC)

Let us see if that works. I will do the split. 84.127.82.127 (talk) 02:03, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

Before fixing navigation and merging references, does it look good? Is any content missing? 84.127.82.127 (talk) 06:40, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

seems reasonable, but I didn't check it entirely (yet). Frietjes (talk) 14:57, 25 October 2014 (UTC)

That was a good exercise. I think that this article is better than before regarding accessibility. I would love to see this list becoming featured; however, I have reasons to believe that I should stop working on this list. 84.127.82.127 (talk) 08:46, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia cannot be broken

On second thought, I have advocated for jokes in article namespace and not-so-notable articles. Why should this list not become featured? Let us give it a try. 84.127.82.127 (talk) 07:16, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

Date format

I am prone to using the YYYY-MM-DD format for practical reasons, but because this article belongs to word-based WikiProjects, I think that the generic Wikipedia format (DMY) will be more appropriate. 84.127.82.127 (talk) 07:16, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

Initial accessibility concerns

Before checking the featured criteria, Frietjes' initial concerns should be addressed:

• lack of section headings (navigation to sections)

 Done

• navigation to the top
• width of the article

 Done

• massive number of small tags

 Done

Regarding navigation to sections, I think that this list needs a custom table of contents, using timelines. 84.127.82.127 (talk) 19:05, 30 October 2014 (UTC)

I don't think we need a custom TOC. the current TOC seems nearly functional. Frietjes (talk) 19:11, 30 October 2014 (UTC)

In that case, we should favor section headings over table ones. Let me unify the headings. 84.127.82.127 (talk) 19:36, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

Unified; I hope that this is an improvement. Do the sections really need a link to the top? 84.127.82.127 (talk) 20:50, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

The reasons in this writing against these links look convincing. This practice is not used in featured lists from WikiProject Poetry. Registered users are able to add "back to top" links if they want to. Therefore, we should not add these links. 84.127.82.127 (talk) 21:33, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

Removing the small tags has improved readability. The horizontal scrolling does not seem excessive, although that should be revisited. On a related topic, I will change "Publishing details" to "Publication" because table headings should be concise. 84.127.82.127 (talk) 22:50, 2 November 2014 (UTC)

thanks. I have wondered if there might be a better way to handle cases with multiple authors. having a list for the authors is fine, but their individual biographical details is detached in a second list. this makes it slightly harder to parse which birth/death date is associated with which author. I had played around with using rowspans for this case, but gave up before since it was further complicated by the Iliad and Odyssey occupying the same row. however, it may be slightly easier to do now. the trick would be to make it still appear as one row without using a massive amount of css. Frietjes (talk) 15:03, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

• Current

Translator		Publishing details		Proemic verse	Link
Ozell, John, William Broome, and William Oldisworth	d. 1743, translator, accountant, 1689–1745, poet, translator, 1680–1734	1712	London, Bernard Lintott

• Proposed

Translator		Publishing details		Proemic verse	Link
Ozell, John,	d. 1743, translator, accountant,	1712	London, Bernard Lintott
William Broome,	1689–1745, poet, translator,
and William Oldisworth	1680–1734

Here is an example. The technical challenge is, currently, that class=mergedrow can only be applied to bordered infoboxes. it may be possible to get this extended to wikitables, but I will have to ask at MediaWiki talk:Common.css. Frietjes (talk) 15:03, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Would it be clearer if borders were displayed?

Translator		Publishing details		Proemic verse	Link
Ozell, John	d. 1743, translator, accountant	1712	London, Bernard Lintott
Broome, William	1689–1745, poet, translator
Oldisworth, William	1680–1734

84.127.82.127 (talk) 23:45, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

having the borders would be fine with me in this case. I was initially looking to achieve the same general appearance, but the borders would probably make it clearer. Frietjes (talk) 01:08, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Subject of the list

The classification by translator looks convenient and every row has its translator. However, the name of this list is "English translations of Homer", not translators. This list was not meant to record who has written about Homer, but what their points of view are. Therefore, this list should focus on the translation, the proemic verse, and many details about the translators should be moved to their own articles. Do you agree? 84.127.115.190 (talk) 23:59, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

yes, I generally agree. the only issue would be if the translator does not have an article, and it would a shame to lose verifiable information that could be used for generating an article in the future. of course, that is if the information is verifiable and correct. Frietjes (talk) 15:37, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

The notability of these translators comes from the translation; it is important to eventually find the translation, novel or radio transcription (resource request). There are more than twenty red links; could these less notable translators make a list in a subarticle? 84.127.115.190 (talk) 00:41, 7 November 2014 (UTC)

possibly, or just move these details to the "Translators" section? Frietjes (talk) 20:10, 7 November 2014 (UTC)

How about this approach? 84.127.115.190 (talk) 22:52, 7 November 2014 (UTC)

Proemic verse sources

This list should be based on primary sources regarding the proemic verse; each row should have a reference to the translation. 84.127.115.190 (talk) 19:21, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

I really needed that laugh, thanks. 84.127.115.190 (talk) 07:29, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Source locations

This is a list of possible source locations, which should help future editors:

Translator	Title	Locations	Found
Hall	Ten Books of Homer's Iliades, translated out of French	Early English Books Online British Museum
Rawlyns	Nestor his Antilochus (Iliad, book 23, lines 304–325)	The British Library

Updated: 84.127.115.190 (talk) 10:45, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

Publications

Publishing details should be moved to the primary source references, using the publisher and place parameters. The list should only display the date; although author's nationality seems important, I fail to see how a translation is affected by the publication place. 84.127.115.190 (talk) 19:21, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

Requests for clarification on intro to Iliad

You don't need those here as the topic is adequately covered in the main article cited. We cannot prove every thesis of homeric studies in every article. These facts are well-known and well covered in the articles referenced. I note also the request is not from a WP user with a login. It is a special page from a user with minimal entries and frequent reversions.Botteville (talk) 09:58, 19 November 2014 (UTC)

We can verify every mentioned thesis of Homeric studies in every article; Botteville does not have to. Could the user indicate which sources support the material? 84.127.115.190 (talk) 09:17, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

This is the last I am going to reply to you as you are far from a sincere person. WP does not require a reference in a footnote if the article is linking you to another article where the topic(s) are adequately referenced, and that is the case here. Moreover, if you start repeating the referenced material every time the topic comes up in other aticles you will soon be gatting tags for repetitious content. The blue links take away the need for repetition and are a satisfactory substitute for the footnotes, provided they cover the material, which is true in this case. I am only explaining this policy for the sake of the public, not for you, as you know it perfectly well. Your effort to characterize me as someone seeking exclusion from the rules is nothing but more vandalism. See my other reply to you below. I will not reply to you further and I will just revert any further vandalisms you make unless someone else does it first (and they probably will).Botteville (talk) 03:06, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

There is no hurry to reply. Although an inline citation is not required for every use in the article, could Botteville indicate in this page which sources in the original articles support each material? 84.127.115.190 (talk) 12:21, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

PS On looking at the changes made I see that content was removed to render the reference apparently inapplicable. This is pretty clearly vandalism by a vandal. He made other changes to the article. I can't revert automatically because other changes were made subsequently. There is no one with whom to discuss and no discussion. I put back what I had but I did not check the rest of the article yet. It will eventually get reviewed by me. This is a large article, especilly vulnerable to vandalism.Botteville (talk) 10:33, 19 November 2014 (UTC)

Probable extensive vandalism

Just as I suspected, the notes on the article have been vandalized by altering information and putting up phony requests for page numbers and other citations. They are easy to vandalize because they are pretty much ignored and virtually out of sight. This is a more subtle vandal attack because he hides the vandalism. To me, this sapproach indicates deliberate concealment of a more experienced editor and a planned intent to sabotage WP. I cannot say how extensive the attack has been until I review further. I at least suspect the vandal I just dealt with in the preceding topic of this discussion. I recommend this article be locked as is Homer.

I am amused by Botteville's edits. I would like to join the party, but unfortunately I am already hunting three fake sources and my edits are being scrutinized. I said that this list should become featured and I stand by my words; if it is possible, it will happen eventually. 84.127.115.190 (talk) 09:06, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

I'm not amused by your disruptive replies. If we look at your special page we see the vandalism tag on over half of them. Apparently, all you have to offer is vandalism. Why do you not get a user page and make your arguments like everyone else? You aren't amused, there is no party and I cannot imagine what you may be doing that qualifies as "hunting three fake sources." What you are doing is vandalizing an honest effort to create a popular, interactive, online encyclopedia. How do you know your edits are being scrutinized? How can anyone communicate with you? You have no user or discussion page. But, I am not going to encourage you to get those. With such a terrible start you should get off and stay off. But, you've been on before, haven't you? So, this a deliberate, premeditated decision to cause harm and waste time. I don't like you, you smart-alec p---. I'm breaking WP policy even to talk to you, but I will not allow you the appearance of an honest reply. My advice, which you would never have the sense to ask, is to try and live as honestly as you can. It's not a new idea.Botteville (talk) 02:54, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

We could talk about Botteville's law in a user page, if Botteville wants to. Some Wikipedians are in favor of humor, others are not. For instance, Tobias Conradi apparently blanked with permission Ezhiki's user page years ago;[1] patterns emerge indeed. However, this page is not the appropriate one to discuss philosophy. 84.127.115.190 (talk) 12:21, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

Bio info removal

I removed this from the notes: "Thomas Grantham". Oxforddnb.com. Retrieved 3 August 2011.

For the other names that have an article, the names are linked to the article. That is where the info belongs. This name has no article but one is requested (red color). Meanwhile bio info was placed in the note. Such a method is rare if not non-existent for the other entries in red. I don't think it goes there. Moreover, it puffs out unnecessarily the already extensive notes. But, it should be available as a starter whenever someone attempts the article. So, I have removed the note to here.Botteville (talk) 11:57, 19 November 2014 (UTC)

Indeed, parking material is allowed. We should do that in the last stages of the preparation. 84.127.115.190 (talk) 17:35, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

External links modified

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Proemic verses for alternate versions

Going through and adding some proemic verse previews, I noticed that for some translations (especially old ones), the translator kept revising and re-revising his translation over numerous editions so that they differ.... and I don't just mean in a few places, I mean that sometimes they are entirely different. For example, compare the F.W. Newman version here on archive.org with the Amazon preview here. In these cases, what should we do for the proem preview? 64.179.181.178 (talk) 03:01, 20 April 2017 (UTC)

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Translators section

Do we really need the "Translators" section, which consists of nothing but a massive graph that doesn't add much information? Its presence also seems to add to the kind of "template bloat" that Wikipedia articles frequently suffer from, where editors need to input new information via an arcane format which then auto-generates the content. I propose getting rid of the entire section. 209.159.238.28 (talk) 21:52, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

Date of G.H. Palmer's translation

Article here (and in Palmer bio) says translation of The Odyssey dates to 1894. In fact it is 1891: https://books.google.ca/books?id=PrBMAAAAMAAJ 65.93.213.4 (talk) 16:42, 10 June 2024 (UTC)