Читать книгу On Translating Homer онлайн

25 страница из 55

and so on. Again; in another passage which I have before quoted, where Zeus says to the horses of Peleus,

τί σφῶϊ δόμεν Πηλῆϊ ἀνάκτι

θνητῷ; ὑμεῖς δ’ ἐστὸν ἀγήρω τ’ ἀθανάτω τε·^[8]

Why gave we you to royal Peleus, to a mortal?

but ye are without old age, and immortal.

Chapman sophisticates this into:

Why gave we you t’ a mortal king, when immortality

And incapacity of age so dignifies your states?

Again; in the speech of Achilles to his horses, where Achilles, according to Homer, says simply ‘Take heed that ye bring your master safe back to the host of the Danaans, in some other sort than the last time, when the battle is ended’, Chapman sophisticates this into:

When with blood, for this day’s fast observed, revenge shall yield

Our heart satiety, bring us off.

In Hector’s famous speech, again, at his parting from Andromache, Homer makes him say: ‘Nor does my own heart so bid me’ (to keep safe behind the walls), ‘since I have learned to be staunch always, and to fight among the foremost of the Trojans, busy on behalf of my father’s great glory, and my own^[9]’. In Chapman’s hands this becomes: