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The Aeneid (Oxford World's Classics)

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Three translations of the Aeneid have appeared in rapid succession over the past two years: Robert Fagles's overhyped commercial bomb, Sarah Ruden's terse, Stanley Lombardo-esque treatment, and this one, the best of the bunch, Frederick Ahl's. Professor Ahl spent over a decade working on his translation, even longer than Virgil took to write the original. Ahl has produced not only the best translation of the Aeneid in English, but also a work that can stand on its own as a piece of high-quality literature.

Fagles apparently churned out his translation because it was expected of him; he was still riding the crest of his Iliad and Odyssey translations, both of which were critically and commercially praised, and his publisher figured a Fagles Aeneid would follow suit. It didn't. Ruden produced her Aeneid after her translations of Lysistrata and Satyricon, amidst a marketing hoopla of her being "the first woman to translate the Aeneid" and etc. Only, Ruden has gone on the record several times in the past, stating that she thinks the Aeneid is "boring" and that it's "hard to understand." Not the sentiments one would wish to hear from a translator.

Ahl, on the other hand, is a lifelong lover of the Aeneid, an enjoyer of Virgil's puns and anagrams and wordplay - things which previous English translators have purged from their translations. And, most importantly, Ahl is that rare case of a professor who is capable of poetry. Before reading Ahl's version I read the first half of Fagles, which seemed bland; more like the outline, if you will, that Virgil might have worked off of while writing the real thing. Ahl's translation however is a flash of lightning, filled with the fire and grandeur of the Latin original. And sure, some of it may come off as a bit TOO "this is poetry, people," but overall its merits far outweigh any drawbacks.

An example of the three translations should give a better example. Here is how each of them handles the opening lines of the epic:

Fagles translation:

Wars and a man I sing - an exile driven on by Fate,
he was first to flee the coast of Troy,
destined to reach Lavinian shores and Italian soil,
yet many blows he took on land and sea from the gods above -
thanks to cruel Juno's relentless rage - and many losses
he bore in battle too, before he could found a city,
bring his gods to Latium, source of the Latin race,
the Alban lords and the high walls of Rome.

Ruden translation:

Arms and a man I sing, the first from Troy,
A fated exile to Lavinian shores
In Italy. On land and sea, divine will -
And Juno's unforgetting rage - harassed him.
War racked him too, until he set his city
And gods in Latium. There his Latin race rose,
With Alban patriarchs, and Rome's high walls.

Ahl translation:

Arms and the man I sing of Troy, who first from its seashores,
Italy-bound, fate's refugee, arrived at Lavinia's
Coastlands. How he was battered about over land, over high deep
Seas by the powers above! Savage Juno's anger remembered
Him, and he suffered profoundly to establish a city,
Settle his gods into Latium, making this land of the Latins
Future home of the Elders of Alba and Rome's mighty ramparts.

Now, anyone can come up with a pretty good first seven lines (though it takes Fagles eight); the meat of the epic itself will tell the final tale. Yet in these short intros one can see that where Fagles and Ruden sacrifice Virgil's grandeur for brevity, Ahl has attempted to infer some of the epic into English. Fagles and Ruden have basically given us prose in poetic format. Ahl has attempted to give us actual poetry. This is more apparent when he brings in the puns and anagrams with which Virgil littered the Aeneid. Wordplay which, when read aloud, provides an aural approximation of the things and events which the words describe. This is more easily shown by example. Here is Ahl's rendering of the famous scene of Laocoon's demise at the tentacles of a sea creature; note the many s's, implying those slithering serpents:

Neptune's priest, Laocoon, chosen by lot for this honour,
Stood sacrificing a victim, a monstrous bull, at the altars.
Look! Across tranquil depths, out of Tenedos, writhing and coiling,
Big orbs swishing a course, twin serpents - I shudder, recalling -
Slither the sea's surface, stretch for the shore in their parallel lunges.
Now, amid surf, chests standing erect, crests mane-like, in aspect
Blood-red, up they surge on the swell, bodies skimming the water,
Spiralling measureless tails in whiplash whirls of propulsion.

You can hear those tentacles slithering from the sea for poor Laocoon. You can taste the fear and panic instilled by those "spiralling measureless tails."

Here's how Fagles renders the scene:

Laocoon, the priest of Neptune picked by lot,
was sacrificing a massive bull at the holy altar
when - I cringe to recall it now - look there!
Over the calm deep straits off Tenedos swim
twin, giant serpents, rearing in coils, breasting
the sea-swell side by side, plunging toward the shore,
their heads, their blood-red crests surging over the waves,
their bodies thrashing, backs rolling coil on mammoth coil
and the wake behind them churns in a roar of foaming spray

Gone is the terror those serpents instill in Ahl's translation. And gone are those delicious s's which play on the reader's tongue, dripping with the oncoming threat of a serpentine death.

Here's how Ruden translates the sequence:

Laocoon, the chosen priest of Neptune,
Was at the altar, slaughtering a large bull,
When over the calm sea from Tenedos
Came two huge, coiled snakes - even now I shake.
Breasting the waters, paired, they sought the beach.
They reared among the waves, their blood-red crests
Towering, while their bellies trailed the surface.
Their backs were flowing in enormous spirals.

Exactly the sort of translation you'd expect from someone who finds the Aeneid "boring." Notice too the absence of any puns or wordplay; even Fagles hinted at them in his otherwise bland translation.

There are problems with Ahl's translation, however. Several lines bleed over into the next, resulting in the capitalization of undeserving letters, which is a bit jarring. More jarring are the asterisks which litter the text, referring to notes in the back. This is an unsightly blemish on an otherwise fine production; asterisk after asterisk clogging up the poetry only serves to throw off the reader's attention. Fagles has the better idea, leaving the text unaffected, with notes residing by themselves in the back, unattested to; leaving it up to the reader to hunt for them, if something in the text throws him into confusion. As reader-unfriendly as this is, it still serves for a better reading experience when it comes to the epic itself.

But a minor quibble. This is the best English translation of the Aeneid you can buy. It retains a power, force, and majesty which is lacking in most English versions, and it's been slaved over by a man who so loves this epic that he's spent the past fourteen years working on it, resulting in this fine book which you can now place in your cart within a matter of seconds.

Mandelbaum's translation is a classic, not to mention very useful to any Latin student who wishes to read an English text that precisely suggests the original Latin. However, Frederick Ahl's translation does what Mandelbaum's does not: express the text with character and poetry that truly conveys the heart and spirit of the original work. While there is the occasional awkward line here and there, this has to be the best translation of the Aeneid presently in print. A wonderful read, not to be missed!