Aeneid (Dover Thrift Editions) (Paperback)

by Vergil (Author), Charles J. Billson (Translator)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Monumental epic poem of Aeneas, a Trojan who escaped the burning ruins of Troy to found a new city in the west — Rome.

Language Notes
Text: English, Latin

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Product Details Paperback: 256 pages Publisher: Dover Publications (December 20, 1995) Language: English ISBN-10: 0486287491 ISBN-13: 978-0486287492 Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.2 x 0.7 inches Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies) Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews) Amazon.com Sales Rank: #256,665 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books) Popular in this category: (What's this?) #3 in  Books > Literature & Fiction > Authors, A-Z > ( V ) > Vergil

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2 Reviews 5 star:  (2) 4 star:    (0) 3 star:    (0) 2 star:    (0) 1 star:    (0)           Average Customer Review 5.0 out of 5 stars (2 customer reviews)		Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews 15 of 20 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars "...one whom Virtue crowned...", March 25, 2002 By  "encolp1850" (Tenn.-- Pittsfield; Pfaff's; and Petitpas'...) - See all my reviews [This review refers to the Dover Thrift verse edition of the AENEID translated into English by Charles J. Billson in 1906.] As incredible as it may seem, I prefer this Billson verse translation over that of Allen Mandelbaum (which I also have in the Bantam Classic edition, 1970). What causes one person to like one translation, and another to prefer someone else's? It is a matter of taste, but also of conditioning through aesthetic experience and expectation. I have read a great many poems in a great many forms. To my sense and sensibility there is something about the Mandelbaum translation of the AENEID which is too confining...too clipped... it does not seem, to me, to flow freely. And yet Billson's translation has archaic word choices -- but the flow of his translation seems more interesting and "freer" than that of Mandelbaum. Here is a sample of Mandelbaum: I sing of arms and of a man: his fate had made him fugitive; he was the first to journey from the coasts of Troy as far as Italy and the Lavinian shores. Across the lands and waters he was battered beneath the violence of High Ones, for the savage Juno's unforgetting anger; and many sufferings were his in war -- [Bantam Classic, 1970.] And here is Billson in the Dover edition with the same passage: Arms and the Man I sing, who first from Troy A Doom-led exile, on Lavinian shores Reached Italy; long tossed on sea and land By Heaven's rude arm, through Juno's brooding ire, And war-worn long ere building for his Gods A Home in Latium: whence [came] the Latin race, The Lords of Alba, and high-towering Rome. To my senses, and sensibility, there is something about Billson's language and flow which seems to have more august grandeur -- epic style, sound, and sweep. Here is an even more telling example -- the famous scene in which Aeneas plucks the Golden Bough: [Mandelbaum:] ...just so the gold leaves seemed against the dark-green ilex; so in the gentle wind, the thin gold leaf was crackling. And at once Aeneas plucks it and, eager, breaks the hesitating bough and carries it into the Sibyl's house. [Billson:] So on that shadowy oak the leafy gold Glimmered, and tinkled in the rustling air. Forthwith Aeneas grasped the clinging bough, And plucked, and bare it toward the Sibyl's cell. There seems to me a fineness of poetic sensitivity there, in Billson, to choose those words just so -- and have the words almost resonate with the sounds of the objects they are describing. 7 of 15 people found the following review helpful: 5.0 out of 5 stars Billson's Vergil's Aeneid, August 13, 2002 By A Customer What a shame that THIS edition of them all is printed in the worst edition. The paper is brittly, gauzy and somewhat iridescent, the ink is sallow on the paper, the book lacks an introduction, any critical notes (any indication that the last words of the text are in fact the last words, and not a typo or printer's error, seeing as how they end at the bottom of the page and are followed immediately by the plastic cover). It is perhaps because of the Aeneid that the phrase "les traductions sont comme les femmes: quand elles sont belles, elles ne sont pas fideles; quand elles sont fideles, elles ne sont pas belles." I have spent much of the summer in meticulous scrutiny of four editions of the aeneid: the lind, mandelbaum, humphries, and billson. the process has led me to some resultant nasty and pretentious slants of minds against the first and third of the abovelisted translations, which are in many parts mistaken, lacking in detail, and overall, diluted and generalized. the billson is actually a very difficult text if one is without a firm grounding in the english poetry that flourished a few centuries ago; billson takes delightful ''liberties'' in his word choices, and takes a unique and exhilarating grammar form, that is typically ''classical''. i do not recommend reading this one, nor reading it in close comparison to all the other available translations. pick up a copy of wheelock's latin instead.		Ad feedback   Search Customer Reviews Only search this product's reviews

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Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Dover Publications (December 20, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0486287491
• ISBN-13: 978-0486287492
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.2 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #256,665 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in this category: (What's this?)

  #3 in

  Books > Literature & Fiction > Authors, A-Z > ( V ) > Vergil

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "...one whom Virtue crowned...", March 25, 2002

By	"encolp1850" (Tenn.-- Pittsfield; Pfaff's; and Petitpas'...) - See all my reviews

[This review refers to the Dover Thrift verse
edition of the AENEID translated into English
by Charles J. Billson in 1906.]

As incredible as it may seem, I prefer this
Billson verse translation over that of Allen
Mandelbaum (which I also have in the Bantam
Classic edition, 1970). What causes one person
to like one translation, and another to prefer
someone else's? It is a matter of taste, but
also of conditioning through aesthetic experience
and expectation. I have read a great many poems
in a great many forms. To my sense and sensibility
there is something about the Mandelbaum translation
of the AENEID which is too confining...too clipped...
it does not seem, to me, to flow freely. And yet
Billson's translation has archaic word choices --
but the flow of his translation seems more interesting
and "freer" than that of Mandelbaum.
Here is a sample of Mandelbaum:

I sing of arms and of a man: his fate
had made him fugitive; he was the first
to journey from the coasts of Troy as far
as Italy and the Lavinian shores.
Across the lands and waters he was battered
beneath the violence of High Ones, for
the savage Juno's unforgetting anger;
and many sufferings were his in war --
[Bantam Classic, 1970.]

And here is Billson in the Dover edition with
the same passage:

Arms and the Man I sing, who first from Troy
A Doom-led exile, on Lavinian shores
Reached Italy; long tossed on sea and land
By Heaven's rude arm, through Juno's brooding
ire,
And war-worn long ere building for his Gods
A Home in Latium: whence [came] the Latin race,
The Lords of Alba, and high-towering Rome.

To my senses, and sensibility, there is something
about Billson's language and flow which seems to
have more august grandeur -- epic style, sound, and
sweep.
Here is an even more telling example -- the famous
scene in which Aeneas plucks the Golden Bough:

[Mandelbaum:] ...just so
the gold leaves seemed against the dark-green
ilex;
so in the gentle wind, the thin gold leaf
was crackling. And at once Aeneas plucks it
and, eager, breaks the hesitating bough
and carries it into the Sibyl's house.

[Billson:] So on that shadowy oak the leafy gold
Glimmered, and tinkled in the rustling air.
Forthwith Aeneas grasped the clinging bough,
And plucked, and bare it toward the Sibyl's
cell.

There seems to me a fineness of poetic sensitivity
there, in Billson, to choose those words just so --
and have the words almost resonate with the sounds
of the objects they are describing.

7 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Billson's Vergil's Aeneid, August 13, 2002

By A Customer

What a shame that THIS edition of them all is printed in the worst edition. The paper is brittly, gauzy and somewhat iridescent, the ink is sallow on the paper, the book lacks an introduction, any critical notes (any indication that the last words of the text are in fact the last words, and not a typo or printer's error, seeing as how they end at the bottom of the page and are followed immediately by the plastic cover).

It is perhaps because of the Aeneid that the phrase "les traductions sont comme les femmes: quand elles sont belles, elles ne sont pas fideles; quand elles sont fideles, elles ne sont pas belles." I have spent much of the summer in meticulous scrutiny of four editions of the aeneid: the lind, mandelbaum, humphries, and billson. the process has led me to some resultant nasty and pretentious slants of minds against the first and third of the abovelisted translations, which are in many parts mistaken, lacking in detail, and overall, diluted and generalized. the billson is actually a very difficult text if one is without a firm grounding in the english poetry that flourished a few centuries ago; billson takes delightful ''liberties'' in his word choices, and takes a unique and exhilarating grammar form, that is typically ''classical''.

i do not recommend reading this one, nor reading it in close comparison to all the other available translations. pick up a copy of wheelock's latin instead.