Homer's Muse
Emily Wilson's translations of "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey" and Claire North's "House of Odysseus" reviewed.
This is a companion review to that of “Ithaca” which was posted some months ago.
Goddess, sing of the cataclysmic wrath or Achilles, son of Peleus - “The Iliad” trans. Emily Wilson
Tell me about a complicated man, Muse, tell me how he wandered and was lost - “The Odyssey” trans Emily Wilson
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Neither “The Iliad” nor “The Odyssey” could qualify as bed-time reading (I do like the French term livre de chevet) but when the time and occasion present themselves to take a serious dip into either work it certainly helps to have a good guide – and I don’t mean a quick potted outline of the couple of months of action towards the end of the siege of Troy covered by the Iliad or a traveller’s guide to the journeys of Odysseus.
Rather what is needed is a solid piece of background material that not only sets (in the case of the Iliad) the context in both time and place, but also develops the themes within the work along with a number of select passages which are explained and provide the reader with some material to consider and meditate upon.
For “The Iliad” Robin Lane Fox’s “Homer and his Iliad” is an excellent example of the type of guide I am talking about. I should make it clear that there is a wealth of scholarship on Homer which has developed over the years and there are extensive guides to Homer which reside in libraries, but Fox’s work is readable, accessible and at the same time erudite.
To appreciate Fox’s work it is not necessary to be familiar with “The Iliad” or even to have read it once. For myself I found having a copy of “The Iliad” nearby was of considerable assistance because I could have resort to it when the need arose.
Fox starts his consideration not with the text itself but with the use of a number of intellectual and academic skills to track down the “who” of Homer and the “how” of the Iliad before looking into its “what”.
Since antiquity, there has been a debate on how the Iliad came to be written in the first place. The roots of the work are in oral poetry performed at gatherings held in the Greek ‘Dark Ages’ and perhaps earlier. some suggest that it is an amalgam, a ‘stitching together’ of shorter works made over many years; others that it is a amalgam with a core of original material expanded over generations by different hands.
While classical authors believed that it was the product of one man, sometimes imagined as a blind poet from Samos, few in modern times have felt compelled to try to track down who that man might have been.
Homer was, according to Fox, an oral poet, taught by great masters and was part of a long tradition which may have stretched back to the Bronze Age. Previously reciters were content to link together existing free-standing episodes to form a linear narrative but it is here that the Iliad is different. Its details are interlinked throughout the text, which ‘only make sense in the light of the whole’.
In addition Fox’s study takes us to the Asia Minor of “The Iliad”, searching out geographical locations where the Greeks might have landed, where rivers ran, where hills and mountains were all of which provided not only context for the epic but which revealed a level of intimacy for the location of the work on the part of the story-teller.
Fox points out that the poem contains accurate descriptions of landscape features in the relevant regions; together with archaeological findings, this satisfies him (and most scholars) that Troy was a real city, although it remains uncertain that a specific Trojan war took place.
While I was reading about geographical locations I found it handy to refer to a map to ensure precision of location. It seems that Homer may have been Based on the west coast of Asia Minor, somewhere between Ephesus and Miletus, and travelled south to Lycia and north to Troy to garner detail. According to Fox he was not simply a poet. He may have been a charioteer – ‘I like to believe he drove a racing team himself’ – a hunter, even a ‘putative gardener’ – all this garnered from fragments of detail that appear in the text.
This interlinked structure leavened by detailed contextual knowledge of locations reveals the genius of a single author who dictated his rehearsed, perfected composition to scribes versed in the newly honed Greek alphabet (which may even have been invented for this purpose).
We all accept without question that the Iliad is a work of ancient literature that was recorded and which has survived because it was recorded. Certainly if we had not been blessed with a written record it is very likely that the oral Iliad of the 21st Century (if it survived) would differ markedly from the oral Iliad of Homer’s 6th Century BC.
That said the written record contains a number of clues, especially mnemonic ones, that demonstrate its oral source. There are frequent standard references to the beginning of the day – rosy fingered dawn, although that said Emily Wilson renders it as “Dawn in her saffron dress”, and in another, “In saffron robes Dawn spread” – or to the state of the waters – the wine dark sea – that would have served as cues for a poet reciting the piece.
This leads to a wider issue which involves the importance of the written record. There are many translations of Homer and into many different languages. The starting point is the written classical Greek but it is not so much the language that is important as the fact that it is written and thus recorded. We may not be able to hear Homer speak his lines but because the lines are written we know precisely what he said and to a certain extent, because of phrasing and metre, we are able to get an impression of how he said it.
But none of this would be possible without the written record. The written record fixes information in time and space. The importance of the written record is its reliability and as we know written records often contemporaneous evidence of transactions that are frequently moulded in different way by the workings of memory and subjectivity. It is for this reason that documentary discovery is so important in court proceedings. It provides records that may differ from recollections stored in memory or even expose a lie (disinformation is the word so often used today but “lie” is simple and direct)
For this reason it is unwise to rely on the oral tradition because the story changes from telling to telling – shifts in wording, changes in emphasis, bits left out, new bits inserted. Because of these shifts and changes the meaning can alter and the reliability of the account becomes suspect.
In law the written record was everything. The printing press saw to that. From the 1530’s when Justice Fitzherbert told lawyers to put their handwritten casenotes to one side because that did not reflect the law – “put that case out of your books for it is not the law, without doubt” (Year Books 27 Hen 8 23 (Tottell, London, 1556) fo 11 STC 9963 The Law French reads “Mettez cest cas hors vostre Livres, car il n’est Ley sans doubte”)– the reliability and standardisation of the record that print allowed enabled Lord Camden to say in Entick v Carrington “If it is law. it will be found in our books. If it is not to be found there, it is not law, without doubt.” (His two last words echo those of Fitzherbert J in Henry VIII’s day).Behind that statement is an understanding of the reliability of the written record as opposed to an oral remembering. Thus to introduce into the law rules that are based on a variable oral tradition – one that even varies from place to place within the same culture – is a fraught and risky enterprise.
Michael Clanchy has written a seminal work (From Memory to Written Record – England 1066 – 1307 3rd ed. Wiley Blackwell Oxford 2013) on the importance of the written word and the transformation of English oral culture to a literate. The production and retention of a number of written records was extended from royal and monastic agencies to much wider forms of everyday business. Charters, writs and other documents became commonplace. And England’s literate mentality developed.
Even so there was a halting acceptance of literate modes by both clerical and lay rulers. The use of writing for business purposes was almost as unfamiliar to many monks in the twelfth century and earlier as it was to knights and the laity. Rules of business such as dating documents were learned with difficulty as did the recognition of the writer’s place in the temporal order. Forgery was rife.
Even as the use of documents increased reading aloud was often preferred rather than scanning silently with the eye.
In the eleventh century unwritten customary law had been the norm, but by the reign of Edward I memory, whether individual or collective, if unsupported by clear written evidence, was ruled out of court. Property rights depended on writing and not the oral recollections of old, wise men. Oral evidence of custom just wasn’t good enough.
Fox suggests that written Greek developed possibly even to enable the recording and preservation of Homer’s epic. I am not enough of a linguist nor philologist to even dip an intellectual toe in those waters but it is not difficult to accept that written Greek may have developed around the time that Homer was involved in his creation and that it enabled the recording of the work in the form that we now have.
In the second half of his book Fox provides a personal view of how Homer set about populating and shaping the Iliad, concluding persuasively that, with the exception of book 10 and a few other passages, the carefully controlled plot, timescale, and character depiction provide clear evidence that it was the work of a single master-poet.
Fox writes in detail, but also incisively, about heroism, heroic ethics, shame and glory, the characters (whom Homer as a rule does not himself describe: he leaves them to talk and act) and swift-footed Achilles. In addition Fox selects a number of passages from the Iliad which are clearly his favourites and illustrate the points he is making. It is at this stage that the reader may put Fox to one side and consult Homer directly. In each case I found the reading valuable, useful and gave a greater understanding of Homer’s work.
Fox’s final section on ‘Parallel Worlds’ discusses the intersection of the heroes with that of the gods, the world of women, the natural world, in which Homer’s similes feature large, and the shield of Achilles made for him by Hephaistos.
This is an unashamed analysis of Homer and his Iliad, uncluttered by anachronism and the turgid tenents of modern literary criticism nor indeed of critical theory.
If you one has some familiarity with “The Iliad” a reader will find many rewards in Homer and His Iliad. And if a reader has yet to fully explore its depths and its thematic and linguistic richness, then you couldn’t ask for a better guide to Homer’s genius than Homer and his Iliad.
So having considered the guidebook, what of “The Iliad” itself. Translations abound. I have Peter Green and Robert Fagles on my shelves and they have been joined by Emily Wilson.
There were nearly 50 English-language versions in the 19th century, at least 30 in the 20th, and a dozen or more already in the 21st. Some are outstanding: Richmond Lattimore (1951) brilliantly reproduced Homer’s rolling dactylic hexameters; the trench-traumatised Robert Graves (1959) evoked Achilles’ alienation and brutality. A call to Achilles in the trenches was the basis of a poem cited by the classical scholar Patrick Shaw Stewart part of which reads:
Achilles came to Troyland
And I to Chersonese;
He turned from wrath to battle,
And I from three days' peace.
Was it so hard, Achilles,
So very hard to die?
Thou knowest, and I know not;
So much the happier am I.
I will go back this morning
From Imbros o'er the sea.
Stand in the trench, Achilles,
Flame-capped, and shout for me.
Wilson’s first great Homeric work was the Odyssey which I discuss below, and her translation of the Iliad was published earlier this year (2023). Right from the start Wilson gets down to it. Achilles emotion is not just anger – the first word of the poem oulomenin she translates as “cataclysmic wrath” and what better term to describe the hugely damaging effects of the rage of Achilles which sits like a shadow over the Iliad until his revenge for the death of Patroclus and the defeat of Hector. That the cataclysmic wrath is assuaged becomes clear when he grants the grieving Priam the body of his son for burial.
Wilson’s introduction helps a modern reader to understand that however petulant we may find the behavior of Agamemnon and Achilles as they snatch at women as though they were objects and consider little beyond their individual status as warriors, they are reflecting the values of the time.
Agamemnon’s and Achilles’ time in a mythic past is one before written records, where a warrior can gain kleos — immortal fame — by competing against friends as well as enemies, and accruing the material rewards that accompany their victories. Fox also addresses the nature of fame and reputation in his discussion. However, Wilson notes, correctly, “Those who are the greatest winners can be damaged most by any loss. Privilege entails terrible vulnerability.”
But the Iliad is not just a poem about the aggressive masculinity of Achilles and Agamemnon, although it is predominantly a tale about men but into the mix is the clever Odysseus with his persuasive tongue. In Book 2, he addresses the Greeks who want to leave Troy. “I do not blame the Greeks for growing restless/behind the curving ships,” he says, with his Goddess Athena standing beside him in support. “But it is shameful/to stay so long and then go back with nothing.”
We also see Patroclus stepping up to heal injured men as they come limping off the battlefield – a battlefield where no holds are barred and make no mistake about it – Homer’s battlefield descriptions are graphically violent in the extreme – so much so that in these gentle times there would probably have to be a trigger warning or perhaps the Censor would place an age restriction on the Iliad. But there are elements of humanity and we see Hector, the Trojan warrior, talking with his wife, smiling at his child. We listen to the wisdom of Priam and Nestor — Trojan king and Greek leader, both long past fighting age — as they offer advice to younger men as older men have a tendency to do – not much has changed.
In Book 3 Helen appears,
“weaving a massive double-layered cloth/in dazzling colors, patterning upon it/the many troubles, tests, and tribulations/that Trojan horsemen and bronze-armored Greeks/suffered at Ares’ hands because of her.”
Helen weaves her tale of the war as Homer weaves his. She is a vital part of the story – it all came about because of her and that oath that Odysseus devised when she was married to Menelaus – and Homer weaves his tale not in cloth but in words in 15600 lines. And using Homer’s words, Wilson weaves her tale.
Wilson’s translation of “The Odyssey” was published – to wide acclaim – in 2017. The first into English was by George Chapman in 1614-15 (remember John Keats’ sonnet about Chapman’s Homer); there have been at least 60 others. This is the first by a woman.
The opening lines demonstrate Wilson’s different approach. Rather than describing Odysseus as cunning or wily she reads it as a complicated man:
Tell me about a complicated man.
Muse, tell me how he wandered and was lost
when he had wrecked the holy town of Troy,
and where he went, and who he met, the pain
he suffered in the storms at sea, and how
he worked to save his life and bring his men
back home. He failed to keep them safe; poor fools,
they ate the Sun God’s cattle, and the god
kept them from home. Now goddess, child of Zeus,
tell the old story for our modern times.
Find the beginning.
Charlotte Higgins in her review of Wilson’s translation in the Guardian makes the following comments about the term “complicated”
“The word Wilson has translated as “complicated” is polutropos, one of Homer’s regular epithets for Odysseus. It means, literally, “many turned” or “much turning”. It leads us to think of his duplicity, his cunning, his epic wanderings, his suffering, the things he does and things that are done to him on his journey home to Ithaca. “Complicated” comes from the Latin verb plico, which means to fold. Plico comes from the Greek pleko, one of whose meanings is devise or contrive; occasionally it means “to form the plot of a tragedy”. The deliciousness of the word “complicated” is that it suggests that the twists and turns have their darker aspects: this man has layers.”
Although the Odyssey is a poem about a man the interactions between Odysseus and some of the female characters in the tale provide an interesting counterpoint. We assume that the Sirens are female, attempting to lure Odysseus, tied to a mast so that he can undergo the temptation and resist it. Circe certainly is female and dangerous to men whose measure she rapidly takes and reduces them to metaphors. Then there is Claypso with whom Odysseus tarries overlong until Poseidon’s curse is removed and he is able to struggle back to Ithaca. But Wilson gives the ladies their voices as well as using her own – this description of Calypso’s grotto provides an example
The scent of citrus and of brittle pine
Suffused the island. Inside, she was singing
And weaving with a shuttle made of gold.
Her voice was beautiful. Around the cave
A luscious forest flourished: alder, poplar,
And scented cypress.
Wilson’s excellent translation captures the spirit of the poetry and is itself poetic in terms of rhythm, language and metre.
The return of Odysseus to Ithaca and the final denoument with Penelope’s suitors is climactic not only of the poem but in terms of drawing the threads of Odysseus’ story together.
In 1997 there was a film adaptation of the Odyssey as a two part miniseries. It stared Armand Assante as Odysseus and Greta Scaachi as Penelope and was a fair interpretation of the poem. The confrontation with the suitors captures the truly climactic nature of the event and is brilliantly and beautifully done. It may be seen here.
Finally there is the second book in the “Song of Penelope” series – “The House of Odysseus” by Claire North. I have already reviewed her first book in the series “Ithaca” and the “House” picks up where “Ithaca” finished. Like “Ithaca” it continues to interweave the tragic tale of the House of Atreus and the aftermath of the murder of Clytemnestra by Orestes – which North
Penelope still struggles to keep the island kingdom together in the face of threats from the suitors and from a new danger which arrives in the form of Menelaus and with him an aging and less than lovely Helen.
Menelaus is Oreste’s uncle and the word is out that Orestes has gone mad. In that state he cannot succeed to the throne of Mycenae and Memelaus of Sparta has eyes not only on that kingdom but on Ithaca as well.
The tale is told using the “eye of God” method – literally although the God in this case is the Goddess Aphrodite (Hera was the tale teller in “Ithaca” and I assume that Athena will tell the tale in the third book of the series.) Aphrodite is unashamedly interested in the physical attributes of some of the male characters – her tale telling is spiced with hints of lust and erotic observations by the way.
Orestes madness is as a result of the Furies who hound him following the murder of his mother. Only Orestes and Aphrodite can see these horrors – clawed and leather-winged – although as the story develops it appears that Orestes visions are drug-induced hallucinations.
Trapped between two mad kings, Penelope must find a way to keep her home from being crushed by the machinations of a battle that stretches from Mycenae and Sparta to the summit of Mount Olympus itself. Her only allies are Elektra, desperate to protect her brother, and Helen of Troy, Menelaus' wife. And watching over them all is the goddess Aphrodite, who has plans of her own.
Odysseus makes an appearance- in the last sentence of the book after the threat of Menelaus has been removed. The suitors are still there but through “Ithaca” and “The House of Odysseus” we have seen a Penelope who is at least as “complicated” as Odysseus. We can only await the third book in the series to see how the retelling of the great story works through from a woman’s perspective in the male dominated society of Classical Greece.