THE ODYSSEY
Translated Into English In the Original Metre
by
Francis Caulfeild, B.A., Oxon
London 1921

BOOK I

ATHENE, TELEMACHUS AND THE SUITORS

SING me the RESTLESS MAN, O Muse, who roamed the world over,

When, by his wondrous guile, he had sacked Troy’s sacred fortress.

Cities of various men he saw: their thoughts he discerned.

Many a time, in the deep, his heart was melted for trouble.

Striving to win his life, and eke return for his comrades:

Yet, though he strove full sore, he could not save his companions,

For, as was meet and just, through deeds of folly they perished:

Fools! who devoured the oxen of Him who rides in the heavens,

Helios, who, in his course, missed out their day of returning.

Yet, how they fared and died, be gracious, O Goddess, to tell us.

Finally, those who remained, escaping from headlong destruction.

Rested at home, now safe from war and the perils of ocean:

Thus, he alone was left, for wife and home still pining.

Kept, in her arched cave, by the Nymph, Our Lady Calypso,

Goddess divine still longing to have him for lord and husband.

But, when the circling years had brought the season appointed

When, in the thread of Fate, was twined his return to his homeland

Ithaca, not even then was he wholly free from his troubles.

Safe among friends: yet the Gods still pitied the godlike Odysseus,

All but Poseidon: and he never ceased from his wrath for a moment.

He, at that time, was chasing the Æthiops, distant abiders,

(Æthiops, living apart, the farthest and last of the nations,

Some where Hyperion sinks to his rest, and some where he rises)

Claiming his hecatomb due, of sheep or maybe of oxen.

There was he feasting at will: but the rest of the Gods in Olympus,

Thronging the halls of Zeus, were gathered together in council.

First of them all to speak was the Father of Gods and of Mortals,

For he remembered well the fate of the handsome Ægisthus

Slain by Atreides’ son, the world-renowned Orestes.

Mindful of him, he thus addressed the assembled Immortals:

“Monstrous it is bowmen put blame on the Gods for all things,

Saying that we are the cause of the evils they suffer: but rather

They, in their impious folly, seek woes that were never ordained.

Thus did Ægisthus marry the lawful wife of Atreides,

And, to complete his crime, he murdered him into the bargain.

Yet he foresaw his fate: ourselves had given him warning

(Sending to him in haste the keen-eyed Slayer of Argus)

Neither to slay Atreides, nor take his consort in marriage:

For that revenge in full should be wrought by the noble Orestes

When he became a man, and longed to return to his homeland.

Thus did Hermes warn: but, spite of his counsel, Ægisthus

Would not obey: and now, at one stroke all is requited."

REVIEW COMMENT

Caulfeild offers a brief note describing how we are to read his hexameter lines, but he offers no defense of the practice. His poetic lines are a good deal clearer than some other hexameter translations of Homer but, after reading a generous selection of his poetry, I get little sense of poetic grace or urgency from his English.

For the full text of Caulfeild’s translation, please use the following link: Caulfeild Odyssey.

[List of Published English Translations of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey]