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| 22382 | (With 800 linked footnotes, No illustrations) |
| 16452 | (In blank verse, Many footnotes.) |
| 2199 | (No footnotes or illustrations) |
| 6130 | (Many line drawings, and 300 footnotes) |
| 3059 | |
| 6150 |
THE
ILIAD OF HOMER,
TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH BLANK VERSE
BY WILLIAM COWPER.
EDITED BY ROBERT SOUTHEY. LL.D.
WITH NOTES,
BY M.A. DWIGHT,
AUTHOR OF “GRECIAN AND ROMAN MYTHOLOGY.”
NEW-YORK:
D. APPLETON & CO., 346 & 348 BROADWAY.
M.DCCC.LX.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1849,
By M.A. DWIGHT,
in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court for the Southern Districtof New York.
TO THE
RIGHT HONORABLE
EARL COWPER,
THIS
TRANSLATION OF THE ILIAD,
THE INSCRIPTION OF WHICH TO HIMSELF,
THE LATE LAMENTED EARL,
BENEVOLENT TO ALL,
AND ESPECIALLY KIND TO THE AUTHOR,
HAD NOT DISDAINED TO ACCEPT
IS HUMBLY OFFERED,
AS A SMALL BUT GRATEFUL TRIBUTE,
TO THE MEMORY OF HIS FATHER,
BY HIS LORDSHIP’S
AFFECTIONATE KINSMAN AND SERVANT
WILLIAM COWPER.
June 4, 1791.
PREFACE.
Whether a translation of Homer may be best executed in blank verse orin rhyme, is a question in the decision of which no man can find difficulty,who has ever duly considered what translation ought to be, or who is in anydegree practically acquainted with those very different kinds of versification.I will venture to assert that a just translation of any ancient poet in rhyme,is impossible. No human ingenuity can be equal to the task of closingevery couplet with sounds homotonous, expressing at the same time thefull sense, and only the full sense of his original. The translator’s ingenuity,indeed, in this case becomes itself a snare, and the readier he is at inventionand expedient, the more likely he is to be betrayed into the widest departuresfrom the guide whom he professes to follow. Hence it has happened,that although the public have long been in possession of an English <