E. V. Rieu
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Dr. E.V. Rieu— in full Emile Victor Rieu (1887–1972)— is best known for his lucid translations of Homer, as editor of Penguin Classics, and for a modern translation of the Gospels, which evolved from his role as editor of a projected Penguin translation of the Bible. His translation of the Odyssey, 1946, was the opener of the Penguin Classics, a series that he edited from 1944 to 1964. He also translated Virgil.
Patrick Kavanagh evoked the translations' crisp and readable character in a poem "On Looking into E. V. Rieu's Homer"
- "In stubble fields the ghosts of corn are
- The important spirits the imagination heeds.
- Nothing dies; there are no empty
- Spaces in the cleanest-reaped fields." [1]
The genial and witty Rieu was a friend and editorial mentor of the science fiction writer Olaf Stapledon. His son, D.C.H. Rieu, has revised his translations.
The sole contemporary rival to his prose translation of the Iliad was the verse translation of Richmond Lattimore.
[edit] Notes
- ^ The implied comparison is with Keats' "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer"
[edit] References
- "Translating the Gospels: A Discussion Between Dr. E.V. Rieu and the Rev. J.B. Phillips". Interview of 3 December 1953.
- E.V. Rieu, "Hall and Knight" A hilarious account of the production of the textbook, Hall and Knight's Elementary Algebra for Schools, first published in Rieu's collected verse, Cuckoo Calling (London:Methuen) 1933)
