Robert Fagles, a translator of much that we read in Torrey, has died.
Fagles was an awe inspiring scholar of enduring importance. His greatness came as a translator of works from classical languages into English.
Like all such works, his translations were a mixed blessing and Torrey has phased out some of them. Using his work was always a tough call as the only translation student would read. On the one hand, his translations were often too much like a paraphrase for students to do careful work (if they did not know at least some Greek), but on the other hand were readable and clear enough to allow first-time readers to get the gist of Homer and Virgil.
Having read some Fagles every year for at least a decade, I can report that the merits of his work far outweighed the vices.
His work in Homer is a good example of the best of Fagles and the worst.
At the worst, he would add a seemingly important word to the text, for example “star,” that was not in the original and so confuse a careful reader into seeing meaning where there was none. Forget writing a careful freshman paper on references to the heavens in Homer if you are using Fagles. There was too little consistency in his translation to trust the details.
But his merits as a translator of Homer were great, often conveying the feeing of Homer, even when he had to mess with some details to do so. He aimed to get the flow of Iliad and at that I think he succeeded as well as any English translator could.
A freshman who read Fagles would understand the allure of the wine dark sea, sail on it (if ever) with trepidation, and understand the longing to find home, even if she would find another translation to use in her paper.
There is much to be said for that.
No translation, as he himself pointed out, is as good as the original. However, for those who cannot enjoy Homer directly, a wide range of translations is necessity. There is value to “harder to read” translations like Lang and culture interest in seeing what someone like Pope did with the text. Perseus makes everyone able to do a tiny bit of work in Greek.
If you must read one, then my favorite remains that of Lattimore, but do not read just one.
Make your second that of Fagles who has gone on to another voyage from the wars of this life leaving us a great treasure.
May he find home.