[Consim-l] Iliad (was Re: Craonne)

[John Best]

Hi wargamers,
I tagged a previous post with some of my current reading:
>>
>> The Trojan War, Barry Strauss (way
>> too much "pop history" for me; it doesn't need that to "bring the story 
>> to
>> life"--the story is pretty darn compelling as it is.  Stick with "The
>> Iliad", Robert Fagales translation)

And Dave Kohr kindly responded:

>
> For what it's worth, back in undergrad when I was a classics major, my
> professor of ancient Greek
> strongly preferred Lattimore's translation, because he thought it's
> the most accurate:
>
> 
> http://www.amazon.com/Iliad-Homer/dp/0226469409/ref=pd_bbs_sr_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1196879098&sr=8-3
>
> Probably Fitzgerald's would have been his second choice, though a
> distant second.
>
Wow, you were actually a classics major?  I think that's really cool.  For 
what it's also worth (maybe not much), the Lattimore translation is still 
also apparently widely used (as is the Fagales).  I'm sure your former prof 
had an expert's knowledge of accuracy, but I think the Fagales first line is 
typical of the lyricism that he carries through the whole work: "I sing of 
warfare and a man at war."  I'm not familiar with the Fitzgerald; however, I 
can say that it is more interesting than one might think to read different 
translations side by side.
Obligatory wargame reference:  I think there are games about The Iliad, or 
the Trojan War more generally, but I'm really not sure how they would work. 
One of the things that's interesting is that the actual troops (of which 
Homer says there were 100,000) are curiously nonconspicuous in the epic 
poem, which would mean that a wargame with "units" and what not would be a 
real fudge from the poem.  Thanks for responding Dave, and thanks for 
reading.
John Best
jlbest at advancenet.net