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I want to read a good number of the great epics over the next couple of years or so. I'm asking /lit/ for advice on the best version of each one. My interest is in finding translations that attempt to convey the feel of the original, instead of focusing solely on ease of comprehension.
- I prefer verse translations to prose translation, but it's not a deal breaker.
- I would like versions that have some annotation, but don't beat you over the head with it the way a Norton annotated does.
These are the books I'm interested in specifically:
The Odyssey (Homer's)
The Illiad and the Odyssey (Pope's)
The Metamorphoses
The Song of Roland
Beowulf
Dante's Purgatory/Paradiso/etc.
Le Morte d'Arthur
Sidney's Arcadia (A good Sidney collection would be appreciated)
Books I have already: The Illiad (Barnes and Nobles version, not terrible but not great either), the Aeneid, the Niebelungenlied, the Faerie Queene and Paradise Lost.
I'm reading these in historical order, for the most part, because each builds on those which preceded it. This is why truth to the original is necessary.
cont.
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For example: The Song of Roland is filled with the word "Paynim" (to mean Pagan) and descriptions of killed "Paynims" being "tipped, screaming into the pit" (hell) while the French knights that die are described as ascending to heaven.
Aside from being hilarious, this is important because Elizabethans who use this terminology are giving the reader a wink-wink nudge-nudge reference; for instance, Spenser in Book I with his three "Paynim" knights, Sansfoy, Sansjoy and Sansloy; one of which, Sansfoy, when killed is described as flitting "Whither the soules do fly of men that live amis."
If I'd read a "modernized" translation of Roland that omitted the word Paynim and the scenes of dead Saracens falling to hell, I would not get Spenser's reference; and, unfortunately, many of the translations I'm looking at on Amazon do just that.
Thus, overly modernized translations/versions are useless since my goal is to read these in relation to one another.
tl;dr: Suggestions of epics I should read that aren't on this list? In particular classical works I've omitted; I would consider non-Western epics (Gilgamesh, for instance), although they don't really fit into the "timeline" properly.
Are post-Paradise Lost attempts at the Epic like Moby Dick or Ulysses worth reading as part of this exercise?
>inb4 "stop liking what I don't like"
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get the Rebsamen verse translation for Beowulf, it maintains the alliteration and stress patterns from the Old English.
and absolutely NOT the Seamus Heaney version.
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Other good epics that you might want to check out include:
The Argonautica, Appolonius of Rhodes
The Aenead, Virgil - A spiritual successor to Homer
Also if you want I suggest picking up
"The Greek Epic Cycle" by Malcolm Davies for some information on the lost Greek epics.
Anonymous
What age did you first feel confident in writing your novel? 2017-03-03 11:34:33 Post No.9182798
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What age did you first feel confident in writing your novel? 2017-03-03 11:34:33 Post No.9182798
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What age did you first feel confident in writing your novel?
Anonymous
2017-03-03 11:34:33
Post No. 9182798
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I'm 20 and want to write a semi auto-biographical novella detailing the process of misunderstanding how to interact with University society and being in a melancholic slump to pulling oneself out and finding ways to make Uni a more tolerable experience.Something in the style of say "Nausea" where the protagonist just wanders around making observations. I think it'd be funny and potentially relevant to a lot of people I know so it'd be nice to do for writing's sake. But I feel like as a 20 year old I'm not experienced or well read enough to produce any sort of novella or novel. Short stories sure but I feel like I ought to be older before trying something of greater length. What do you guys think? How have you felt in regards to confidence in writing in relation to your age and how experience you feel?
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just write it, how else are you going to get experience?
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>>9182806
Good point. I need to stop being afraid of being shit because I'm always gonna be shit and get a little better with each effort presumably.
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>>9182820
where you from brotha
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Are there any /lit/ approved notebooks and/or journals? How about pens?
What are some of your favorites? Feel free to post pics.
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>>9182796
as well as bic ball point pens.
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I use a composition book and a pen I asked my mom if I could borrow.
If you use a fancy pen or some kind of fancy journal you're a pseud.
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>>9182796
Vanities.
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This guy is the greatest philosopher ever lived !
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Lol yes memes
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indeed
have you read his newest?
*nerdgasms*
it is that good!
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>>9183428
At least the title is really nice. Anyone who actually read Dennett? I tried "Intuition pumps" and it bored me to death, so I stopped reading.
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>literally complains about not being able to sit while urinating
Why do you people worship this lazy, emasculated faggot?
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>the future is now, old man
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>>9182764
>not understanding that the gas pipe is so long it would dip into the water if he sat down
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Who is the literary equivalent of Mahler?
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Stifter (I don't know)
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>>9182659
Symphony 3 and 6 a best.
Prove me wrong
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>>9182659
War and Peace
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Apart from whenHumbert tracked and killed Quilty, and perhaps the characterisation of Quilty himself, what are the other signs thatHumbert was an unreliable narrator? What else do you think shouldn't be taken at face value?
Do you think Nabokov was a pervert? Or did he just understand them well enough to write one exceptionally well?
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>>9182647
Wait, what? I trusted Humbert's every word.
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>>9182647
that's when you thought he became unreliable?
most of the first parts of the book are setting up how it's not an accurate account.
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Too late, you spoiled Lolita for me, now I'm going to have to track you down and force feed you eggs.
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challenge:
get 6 words from a random word generator and form it into some intelectual sounding aphorism
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A proud champion of absentness will only encrypt the ultimate injustice.
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>>9182641
kek
only a lunatic worm would controle and replace a crisis with none
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>>9182633
After decades of honeydew bluster, a wall of depression stopped humanity in its tracks. The result was geometric cannibalism. When the first photosynthesizing cells declared their independence, the following generations of mortal man would never know the taste of plants.
Fuck your prompt, it's too limiting.
Could a literate sf story ever be written involving mecha, or is it forever confined to the realms of retrograde military sf and rpg/wargame licensed media?
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>what is starship troopers
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>>9182616
>an angry crypto-fascist soap boxes his views for 200 pages and forgets about having a story, interesting characters, and replaces the dialogue with long monologues of his views
>a literate SF story
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>>9182681
>reductionism that could be applied to any work of fiction masquerading as making a valid point
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>I'm shaking my life and death of the best way to go back in my head.
>The company said in an interview with you guys have to do it again and again for me
>Gay marriage is the most beautiful girl in the first half of the day.
What do you think he was trying to say with these?
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idk
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truly art
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schizophrenia and random word generators
want proove?
>they wanted to compare the purchase to a cosy taste when it merely was a literal commodity
>one can't transform romance into a plastic alliance for the sake of the commandment
>i block the day to spread deduction
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Is making literature more like visual novels the only way to save literature? Add some visuals and music and make it so people can read visual books of their tv and the tyranny of the screen as been supplanted.
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just make a movie already
nothing will surpass books. people who want to read will always turn back to them ( or their electronic equivalent)
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>>9182591
I never knew they mirrored that image for society of the spectacle
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>>9182591
Reading 5 books minimum in a school yea should be mandatory in all countries.
i think it's the cheapest and best way to increase a country's culture. The only danger is idealogues using this to spread propaganda into children but they already do that in their classes so whatev.
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OK. Just got this. I read the first page. Understood it. Not that hard. Not a big deal. But it wasn't that fun. What now?
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>>9182565
Kys
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>>9182565
I read that as SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSStately plump
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>>9182565
The first time I read this I missed the "Stately, plump" part.
>On the internet, a pure genius, a maverick, a winner, simply a God
>In real life, a brainlet, a loser, simply a Dunce
How can one mesh together his Superego with his daily life?
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the internet has different measurements than real life. if you spend too much time online without realizing this, you start to mold yourself to internet standarts. which might make you a god here but a fucking autist irl. it only depends what you value higher.
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>>9182544
How does one realize who they are on the internet to who they are irl?
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>>9182605
well, what achievements are you proud of online and what are those irl?
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what's the definition of a clichée and how do i avoid it?
for example:
analogies like "he had a voice like a mountain"
or
"her skin was soft as velvet"
when (if ever) is it a good idea to use analogies instead of just stating the facts (her skin felt warm and i could feel the bright soft hairs covering it, he had a loud and deep voice).
what about overused stuff like a "dark, stormy night" or "bright, blue sky"?
would it make sense to resort to analogies in such cases? like: the sky looked like a clear aquamarine or the night rumbled as if my grandmothers armoure fell over in the attic.
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>>9182518
or even better, not write such unnecessary stuff at all? leave out the color of the sky, the weather, sensory perception?
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>>9182518
He had a mountainous voice yada yada
Her velvet skin blah blah blah
similes are for gays, write facts instead.
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>>9183606
figured. but what about facts that are clichées?
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I have Camus - The Stranger assigned to me this semester (in 12 weeks).
Since I've already read it in English I was thinking I could read it in French, except I don't know any French whatsoever so I would have to learn it from scratch.
Can I learn enough French in 12 weeks to read it?
Also language learning general.
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Yeah it's one of the most common starter texts assigned because it's easy and subdued prose. Read Sandberg's Reading for French (pirate it) and try snippets of The Stranger in French as you go through the chapters, and in a few weeks you should notice real progress.
Google idioms you don't understand and try to use an annotated language learning version of the book.
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>>9182491
yes, french and english share like 80% of verbs etc, just sit with a dictionary and go to work, google some cheat sheet for tenses
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