The Odyssey (Oxford World's Classics)

This is one of the most accurate and flowing translations of the Greek epic there is

This is the most readable translation I have found. It is definitely worth the $ over the various free ones. The prose is gorgeous.

I bought it for a class to read. Not a big fan of greek mythology and folklore BUT. Arrived on time and is in great condition.

I cannot understand why I am the first person on Amazon.com to review Walter Shewring's splendid translation of Homer's "The Odyssey," which I have adopted with great success in my undergraduate classes on Greek Civilisation and Women in Antiquity. Because Professor Shewring has rendered the epic into prose, it is especially accessible for students who may be unaccustomed to reading lengthy assignments of poetry, no matter how beautifully rendered, as is the Lattimore translation. Shewring's version, moreover, retains the excitement of the narrative as well as the poetic sense of the original, without dumbing down the language, as do some of the current ghastly Shakespeare-made-easy books (I name no names here). One of the best aspects of this translation is Professor Shewring's use of Homer's recurrent themes and epithets. These not only demonstrate the oral tradition behind the epic, which was written down sometime in the seventh century BC, but they also illustrate ongoing Greek attitudes towards women, attitudes that changed little, as far as literary portrayals are concerned, from the Bronze age through Homer's Archaic era and the 5th-century BC Classical period until post-Alexandrian Greece of the 4th-century BC (Of the many inspired--and readable--scholarly books on Homer's women, I recommend Nancy Felson Rubin's "Regarding Penelope" for further study). Students enjoy tracing the identifiable recurrent attributes in the portrayals of Homer's women, for instance, who entrap Odysseus, keeping him from his masculine pursuit of adventure for adventure's sake, and making him forget his homeland (an unforgivable lapse in ancient Greek and Roman thought): the nymph Calypso, and the enchantress, Circe. Both women, in this edition, are portrayed as having long braided hair (symbolic of entrapment in the ancient world), beautiful singing voices (used to enchant); Circe even has the powers of human speech, which Homer designates as unprecedented and bizarre in a woman; both Calypso and Circe move to and fro with golden shuttles before great looms (Like long braided hair, weaving represents entrapment, and the fact that they move to-and-fro with their shuttle/wands demonstrates their power; Professor Rubin has noted that even Faithful Penelope uses her loom as an instrument of trickery.). Finally, both Calypso and Circe are presented as "potniae theron", the powerful mistresses of beasts, women who, using magic potions, transform their lovers into both figurative [Calypso] and literal [Circe] pigs. Professor Shewring's rendition of "the nymph Calypso, a goddess of strange power and beauty" [who] "had kept [Odysseus] captive within her arching caverns" is especially evocative, and the latent sexuality of such Homeric passages has not been lost in translation. This Oxford World Classics edition provides an enlightening Introduction by G.S. Kirk, which discusses the historical background of the epic, the "Homeric Question," whether the epic was written down by one author or many; or whether it harks back to bards of the bronze age (It is thought that the epithets, such as Queenly Calypso and Dawn of the Rosy Fingers, were intended to keep the "unlettered bard" on track during the long epic, which was originally sung and passed down through the generations until it was set in concrete, as it were, when the poem was committed to writing.). The Introduction, furthermore, discusses the geography of the Odyssey, and some of the differences in style between "The Odyssey" and "The Iliad". One of the best features of this edition is the thorough Index and Glossary of Names, which not only identifies each character but also gives the page numbers where each character is to be found. As a practical issue, this feature alone makes the book especially suitable for written assignments on character analysis [The lack of an index--yes, I mean you, Penguin, in your various Plutarch's 'Lives'!--renders any book an exercise in frustration, as far as the classroom is concerned!]. The specific naming of chapters (e.g., "Odysseus Among the Ghosts") also makes the book 'student friendly.' Oxford World Classics is to be congratulated by keeping Professor Shewring's splendid translation of Homer's "The Odyssey" in print. I could not recommend it more highly.

After much study of translations to buy, I chose the prose translation of Walter Shewring, by Oxford. There were choices between E V Rieu , Samuel Butler and Shewring. After comparing the three, I found this translation to be most poetic and accurate. The footnotes were very helpful.The story itself is great, one can learn a lot in dealing with the challenges Odysseus faced on his way. One feels a lot of admiration for the goddess of the gleaming of the eyes- "Pallas Athena"."The Odyssey can divided into two cycles. The first twelve books relates the journey away from Ithaca, while the rest 12 books relates the returing bak to Ithaca. If one has studied the Cosmic Clock Astrology, the first 12 books and the next 12 can be compared with the Clock. The 13th book signifies the 1 o' clock line relating to God Love, where we can find this aspect of God in this chapter."

Shewring's prose translation of "The Odyssey" is a good one for the reader who is looking for the closest rendering of Homer's words. The introductory essay, written by the late G. S. Kirk, emphasizes the oral origins of Homeric poetry and contains a brief summary of "The Odyssey". Shewring translated the epic work according to the Greek text prepared by T. W. Allen. Shewring's epilogue on translation, about 30 pages long, attempts to trace the history of the English translations of "The Odyssey" beginning with the work of George Chapman around 1615; Shewring also explains the difficulties he himself encounters a translator, and how he justifies his own translation. Although the epilogue is fine, I can't understand why -- or how --Oxford U.P. could have thought it an adequate substitute for explanatory notes (this is fundamental!) and a bibliography. Perhaps they were intending to reach a wider audience with this one.

Yes, in answer to the above, students might find this easier to read, but the prose of this translation is ordinary, and lacks the beat of the Homeric text. Homer wrote in 1t-syllable dactylic lines, the "heroic verse" of Aristotle, and its music should be preserved in English. Why not challenge the students to read it in poetry, if of course, one is to understand the talent of the write is, at minimum, equivalent to that of the original.

Excellent

satisfied with the purchase.

correcto

Shewring's is a good translation, the book was in nice shape - like new

Was as described . Arrived promptly