The Penguin Book of Greek Verse

by C.A. Trypanis (Editor)

Earlier edition of ISBN 9780140585957

Genres: Poetry, Ancient History

630 pages, Paperback

Published March 30, 1973

About the author

Constantine Athanasius Trypanis (published as C.A. Trypanis) was a Greek classicist, literary critic, translator and poet.
Born in Chios, Greece, Trypanis received his education at The Classical Gymnasium, Chios and the Universities of Athens, Berlin and Munich. He received a doctorate from the University of Athens in 1937. From 1939-1945 he taught at the University of Athens and, in 1947, moved to Britain where he began teaching at Exeter College in Oxford as the as Bywater and Sotheby professor of Byzantine and Modern Greek. It was also in England that Trypanis' met and befriended the poet Ian Fletcher, whom Trypanis afterwards referred to as "the master," with Trypanis himself "as the pupil". In 1968 Trypanis relocated to Chicago, after acting as a visiting professor at various other American universities, where he taught Classical Literature until 1974. In 1974 he returned to his native Greece, serving as Minister for Culture and Sciences until 1977[2]. He remained in Greece until his death, at age 83, in 1993.

Though his poetry has since fallen into obscurity, his writings received some critical acclaim in his time, with two of his collections, The Stones of Troy and The Cocks of Hades receiving, respectively, the choice of the Poetry Book Society and the Heinemann Award of the Royal Society of Literature of Great Britain. His poetry was also acclaimed by the likes of Theodore Roethke, W. H. Auden and John Wain.[1]. His poetry was first published while he was living in England, and it was also while in England that he began to develop a poetic circle of his own; he wrote his poetry (at least that portion which was published) in English, his second language, which perhaps opens the door to comparisons to the likes of Joseph Conrad and Vladimir Nabokov, both of whom wrote in English, despite being native speakers of Polish and Russian, respectively. Much of Trypanis' poetic writings were centered around the artifacts, history and mythology of antiquity, especially that of Classical Greece and Rome, though others of his poems centered around aspects and events of his contemporary world.

Reviews

[Ryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the old university literature days you used to see a lot of poetry critics referencing “The Greek Anthology.”
Presumably they were talking about the Oxford Book of Greek Verse or the more merciful Oxford Book of Greek Verse in Translation.

The selections of those books may be better (there’s no perfect anthology), but this one combines the two Oxford collections by putting plain prose translations and the original Greek on the same page. Irreplaceable for studying both the meter and meaning of Greek poetry, from Homer to the 20th Century.

[Jay · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the same way we can illicitly understand the Greek in Oscar Wilde's description of smoking cigarettes as the divine μονόχρονος ἡδονή, Constantine A. Trypanis' prose translation of Greek poetry from Homer to George Seferis and Odysseus Elytis in The Penguin Book of Greek Verse is so smooth, yet literal, that we can infer the importance of certain phrases, images and forms that colour the poetry of a turbulent and supremely literary nation through thousands of years in this wonderful and delightful bilingual book. Homer's rosy-fingered dawn, the verses and dialogues of Callimachus, Aristophanes, Euripides and the idylls of Theocritus, the fusion of mythology with Christianity and symbolism, the warm influence of the East, all leave the resplendent beauty of poetry uninhibited in this masterful collection of translations.

There's a much appreciated inclusion of poems dealing with hope and man. When George Steiner idealized the etymology of the word disaster in After Babel as a fall from the stars instead of their unfavourable aspect, the word despair signified to me the fall from hope ever since. The prepositional roots of Euripides' verse then take on a poetic harmony, μεταβάλλει δυσδαιμονία, literally: change is suffering; poetically: change overthrowing, the fall from intellect and devilry.

But the collection has many other beautiful and remarkable excerpts and authors, serving both as deep insights as well as introductions to Hesiod, Semonides of Amorgos, Sappho, Ibycus, Anacreontea, Aeschylus, Pindar, Sophocles, and the dubious poetry of Plato and Aristotle, to name only so little of what this great tome has to offer. But it is also full of truth, as Huxley described the Odyssey. Nevertheless, this book excludes and makes us forget one truth, the famous line composed by Callimachus: μέγα βιβλίον, μέγα κακόν.

Originally posted on Literatured.com.

[Wayne]

This 600 page book covers 3,000 years of Greek poetry, from Homer up to the 20th Century.
This averages five years per page!!!
Homer gets 97 all to himself which equals 485 years!!
(These last two sentences alone are enough to prove that Bertrand Russell's emphasis on the Wonders of Mathematics isn't all it's cracked up to be.
It obviously has serious limitations.)
Sappho gets 8 pages, whereas Plato and Aristotle only get one each. They are strictly classified as philosophers, but this might keep the girls happy.
However she is probably the only woman in the whole bloody book,which is NOT a cause for joy or smugness of any variety.
Anonymous pops up throughout the book...strange!!An argument for reincarnation perhaps?
Sophocles gets 32 pages; Euripides 24; Aristophanes 16...and if I continue with this when AM I going to get time to read it???

[Shallowreader VaVeros · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of my favourite books ever. I thumb through pages and discover beautiful poetry.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great reference book as well as such a huge variety of texts, its fun to read.