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THE

ILIAD OF HOMER,

TRANSLATED INTO

ENGLISH BLANK VERSE.

William Cowper

London 1791

[Sample from the Opening of the Poem]

 
 
 ARGUMENT OF THE FIRST BOOK.
 

The book opens with an account of a pestilence that prevailed in the Grecian camp, and the cause of it is assigned. A council is called, in which fierce altercation takes place between Agamemnon and Achilles. The latter solemnly renounces the field. Agamemnon, by his heralds, demands Brisëis, and Achilles resigns her. He makes his complaint to Thetis, who undertakes to plead his cause with Jupiter. She pleads it, and prevails. The book concludes with an account of what passed in Heaven on that occasion.

BOOK I.

 
 
  Achilles sing, O Goddess! Peleus’ son;
  His wrath pernicious, who ten thousand woes
 Caused to Achaia’s host, sent many a soul
 Illustrious into Ades premature,
  And Heroes gave (so stood the will of Jove)                               5
  To dogs and to all ravening fowls a prey,
  When fierce dispute had separated once
  The noble Chief Achilles from the son
  Of Atreus, Agamemnon, King of men.
    Who them to strife impell’d? What power divine?                         10
 Latona’s son and Jove’s. For he, incensed
  Against the King, a foul contagion raised
  In all the host, and multitudes destroy’d,
  For that the son of Atreus had his priest
 Dishonored, Chryses. To the fleet he came                                 15
  Bearing rich ransom glorious to redeem
  His daughter, and his hands charged with the wreath
  And golden sceptre of the God shaft-arm’d.
    His supplication was at large to all
  The host of Greece, but most of all to two,                               20
 The sons of Atreus, highest in command.
    Ye gallant Chiefs, and ye their gallant host,
  (So may the Gods who in Olympus dwell
  Give Priam’s treasures to you for a spoil
  And ye return in safety,) take my gifts                                               25
  And loose my child, in honor of the son
  Of Jove, Apollo, archer of the skies.
    At once the voice of all was to respect
  The priest, and to accept the bounteous price;
  But so it pleased not Atreus’ mighty son,                                           30
  Who with rude threatenings stern him thence dismiss’d.
    Beware, old man! that at these hollow barks
  I find thee not now lingering, or henceforth
  Returning, lest the garland of thy God
  And his bright sceptre should avail thee nought.                          35
  I will not loose thy daughter, till old age
  Steal on her. From her native country far,
  In Argos, in my palace, she shall ply
  The loom, and shall be partner of my bed.
  Move me no more. Begone; hence while thou may’st.                         40
    He spake, the old priest trembled and obey’d.
  Forlorn he roamed the ocean’s sounding shore,
  And, solitary, with much prayer his King
  Bright-hair’d Latona’s son, Phoebus, implored.
    God of the silver bow, who with thy power                               45
 Encirclest Chrysa, and who reign’st supreme
  In Tenedos and Cilla the divine,
 Sminthian Apollo! If I e’er adorned
  Thy beauteous fane, or on the altar burn’d
  The fat acceptable of bulls or goats,                                       50
  Grant my petition. With thy shafts avenge
  On the Achaian host thy servant’s tears.
    Such prayer he made, and it was heard. The God,
  Down from Olympus with his radiant bow
  And his full quiver o’er his shoulder slung,                                          55
  Marched in his anger; shaken as he moved
  His rattling arrows told of his approach.
  Gloomy he came as night; sat from the ships
  Apart, and sent an arrow. Clang’d the cord
 Dread-sounding, bounding on the silver bow.                                    60
  Mules first and dogs he struck, but at themselves
  Dispatching soon his bitter arrows keen,
 Smote them. Death-piles on all sides always blazed.
 

Review Comment

Cowper’s translation, as he explains, is, in part, designed to correct deficiencies he perceives in Pope’s translation: first, Cowper rejects rhyming couplets as unsuitable for Homeric verse, second, he wishes to correct Pope’s “deviations” from the Greek in order to remain faithful to the Homeric text (“I have omitted nothing; I have invented nothing. . . . My chief boast is that I have adhered closely to my original, convinced that every departure from him would be punished with the forfeiture of some grace or beauty for which I could substitute no equivalent.”), and he mounts a stout defence of blank verse as the most suitable English verse form for translating Homer (citing Milton as an example worth following because of the close resemblance of his style to Homer’s: “A translator of HOMER, therefore, seems directed by HOMER himself to the use of blank verse, as to that alone in which he can be rendered with any tolerable representation of his manner in this particular.” Cowper’s translation received a mixed reception among his contemporaries; they lauded his fidelity to Homer but found his verse lacking in imaginative energy, a view endorsed later by Matthew Arnold, “the translation by Cowper is far superior to either Chapman’s or Pope’s as an interpretation of the poet, but it lacks a certain fire and swing essential winning great poetic renown.”  Nonetheless, Cowper’s translation has endured, not as an especially popular choice, but one which people seem to consult from time to time (and it was the basis for a sound recording by Naxos Audiobooks).

For access to the complete text of Cowper’s Iliad, please use the following link: Cowper’s Iliad.

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