Homer's Odyssey is the thrilling and moving tale of the
wanderings of the hero Odysseus after the end of the Trojan
war. For ten years he experiences storm, shipwreck and
seduction as he tries to find a way home to Ithaca,
contending with the wrath of Poseidon but protected by
Pallas Athena. Meanwhile, his wife Penelope is beset by
suitors who believe him dead...
William Cowper's 1791 verse translation captures both
the touchingly human episodes and the adventurous sweep of
Homer's original.
The Odyssey is one of the two great epics of ancient
Greece, the other being, of course. The Iliad. Of their
author, Homer, we know almost nothing: he probably lived in
the 8th century BC and it is almost certain that he
composed his verse orally, its literary form not being
settled until the 6th century BC. By this time, Homer's
works had come to represent something like the Bible in the
Judaeo-Christian tradition: they formed the artistic, moral
and narrative basis of ancient Greek (and then Roman)
culture. The two epics survived the Dark and Middle Ages,
although they only became widely known again in the
Renaissance period. Since then, they have been repeatedly
translated.
The Odyssey tells the story of the wanderings and
eventual homecoming of Odysseus, King of Ithaca, after the
end of the Trojan War in which he had played such a
conspicuous role - devising and carrying out, for instance,
the winning stratagem of the Wooden Horse. The story is
given in a cleverly varied form - partly consisting of
flashbacks told by Odysseus himself and partly straight
third-person narration: Odysseus' adventures are interwoven
with the fortunes of his wife Penelope (at home in Ithaca)
and his son Telemachus (who sets off to find Odysseus just
as Odysseus is about to return).
Throughout, human endeavour is mingled with divine
intervention - for example, Odysseus enjoys the special
favour of Pallas Athena, but must also contend with the
wrath of Poseidon. Before he is able to reach his native
shore, Odysseus is drawn into affairs with goddesses
(Calypso and Circe); must outwit monsters like the Cyclops
Polyphemus, and successfully evade the allure of the Sirens
or the Lotus Eaters.
The second half of the story concerns the way in which
Odysseus, disguised, retakes his own kingdom from the
greedy suitors who beset Penelope: in this task, he is
helped by Telemachus and two faithful retainers.
What is the enduring appeal of The Odyssey? First, there
is the character of Odysseus himself. He is an
interestingly complex figure in that he is widely admired
by his contemporaries, brave and resourceful; yet he is
also wily, self-seeking and capable of superbly inventive
falsehood when the occasion requires. He is, above all, a
survivor: he endures twenty years' absence from home, and
returns triumphantly to reclaim wife and kingdom - yet, as
Tiresias foretold, he will not settle down but will once
more set forth 'to seek a newer world... to sail beyond the
sunset' (as Tennyson romantically expresses it). Odysseus,
then, is the archetypal wanderer who speaks to that part of
each of us that yearns for escape into the unknown.
The poem itself, of course, is the original adventure
story, with its wide range of character, incident and
setting, but its structure is cleverly controlled and its
language haunting in its loving stress on the fresh, the
beautiful and the awe-inspiring. Homer writes as one who
looks at the world with a fresh wonder, where every dawn is
rosy-fingered in its promise of new places and new
exploits.
But The Odyssey is also full of sharp psychological
insight - for instance, Homer's depiction of Penelope's
pitiful devices for putting off the suitors; and touches of
telling pathos - Odysseus, disguised, is first recognized
in his palace by his faithful dog Argus, who is only able
to wag his tail, unable to rise, and dies 'as soon as he
had lived to see/Odysseus in the twentieth year restored.
'
Homer wrote in hexameters, while Cowper uses blank verse
(unrhymed iambic pentameter) for his version. Translations
of Homer by Dryden, Pope and others had been made
throughout the Augustan period, generally using the rhymed
couplet; but Cowper's version seems to me to combine almost
ideally the dignified music of Milton with the classical
restraint and formality of 18th-century verse. In addition,
there is a hint of the 19th century at a time when
Wordsworth and Coleridge were already active.
William Cowper (1731-1800) was educated at Westminster
and called to the bar in 1754. Bullied at school, he was
subject to repeated bouts of severe depression which
effectively destroyed his legal career and made his private
life equally unsuccessful. This depression became strongly
associated with his religious convictions, which made him
acutely conscious of what he saw as his personal and moral
inadequacy He lived for some time with the Revd Morley
Unwin's family at Huntingdon, and later with John Newton,
the Evangelical minister with whom he wrote some of the
best-loved hymns in the English language (including 'God
moves in a mysterious way'). His best-known works are
probably the discursive satires, such as Conversation and
The Task, which display a sharp wit moderated by sensitive
humanity and a love of the domestic. His translation of The
Odyssey appeared in 1791.
