MOUSEION - Memorial University of Newfoundland

BOOK REVIEWS/COMPTES RENDUS 203
edition.
The introduction concludes with a brief bibliography that is broken
into "Texts," "Commentaries." "Translations." "Studies," and "Other
Works." The old standbys (such as Fraenkel and Commagel') dominate.
with a sprinkling of major recent works (for example, Gregson Davis,
Polyhymnia: Ellen Oliensis. Horace and the Rhetoric of Authority).
Generally this is a good selection. though a few on the list are not what I
would have included (Wilkinson. Horace and His Lyric Poetry, is long
outdated: and why Kiessling and Heinze over Syndikus as the token
foreign-language entry?).
Rudd acknowledges in his Preface the difficulties inherent in translating
Horace. As a general rule. he observes. one can capture either
sense or style, but not both; prose translation is limiting. but translation
into meter inevitably moves one too far away from the original. Rudd
has decided sensibly on a plain. sturdy prose format. the goal of which
is to capture meaning over form (as indeed should be the choice in a
Loeb edition). He avoids colloquialisms and slanginess. As a result. his
edition should be usable for many years. All translations are clear and
readable. Each without exception is a breath of fresh air in comparison
with Bennett's, even though Bennett was one of the less egregious producers
of early "Loebspeak." By way of example. I compare Bennett and
Rudd on the opening six lines of Odes 3.6. delicta maiorum:
Bennett:
Thy fathers' sins. 0 Roman. thou. though guiltless. shalt expiate. till
thou dost I'estore the crumbling temples and shrines of the gods and
their statues soiled with grimy smoke. 'Tis by holding thyself the servant
of the gods that thou dost rule: with them all things begin: to them
ascribe the outcome'
Rudd:
Though guiltless. you will continue to pay for the sins of your forefathers.
Roman. until you repair the crumbling temples and shrines of
the gods. and the statues that are begrimed with black smoke. It is because
you hold yourselves inferior to the gods that you rule. For every
beginning seek their approval: to them attribute its outcome.
It goes without saying that Epodes 8 and 12, mysteriously absent
from Bennett's translation. appear in their full iambic glory in the new
Loeb. Rudd pulls no punches in his renditions of these two: his translations
of these and the other Epodes are. like his versions of the Odes. far
more streamlined and more pleasing to the modern ear than are
Bennett's. They are also. to my ear. livelier and more vigorous than
Rudd's own treatments of the Odes; given his extensive scholarship on
both Horace's and Juvenal's satires. Rudd may be more at horne with
invective than with lyric.