Lost in translations.

Chicago.

I've been delving into The Odyssey the past few days. I recall tenth grade English class, when we whined about having to read the whole thing and managed to whittle it down to group work on individual books, presented in ten-minute skits to the rest of the class. Fun? Yes. Helpful in understanding? Not entirely. I was puzzled before I realized that the majority of the crazy action - the Lotos Eaters, the Kyklopes, etc. - occurs when Odysseus recounts his travels. You tend to miss these things when your memory of a great work of literature is chiefly informed by high school class presentations and O Brother, Where Art Thou? Rather like comparing Naked Lunch, the Cronenberg film, with Naked Lunch, the Burroughs book. In the same spirit? Yes, but I wouldn't count on the movie to act like Cliffs Notes.

The Robert Fitzgerald translation also has a strange allure for me, enough that I felt compelled to seek it out specifically. I prefer his spellings of ancient Greek names - Akhilleus instead of Achilles, Kirke instead of Circe - because they help reinforce how they're pronounced in ancient Greek. Granted, I have only a marginal grasp of the various accent marks, but hard Ks replacing soft Cs and extra vowels where Anglicizing took a shortcut are steps I can handle. At times, the text seems a little awkward, a little too formal, but it doesn't really affect my enjoyment or understanding. I think I use the Matthew Ward translation of Camus's The Stranger as my gold standard, but that's unfair to texts that aren't written with that Hemingway-esque style that I really like.

Compare that with some translations of Dostoevsky that have proven so dull I couldn't finish a short story. (David Magarshack's "Notes From The Underground" springs to mind.) I enjoyed The Brothers Karamazov enough to read it twice - and again some time in the future - so I doubt it's the author. Maybe that's a good guess on my part, maybe not. Still, I'd prefer to accept a less-than-perfect version from which I can take something (or can, at least, plow through), over one that is truer to the author's intent but unreadable.

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And, on a wintry weather note:

Today in Chicago? Rain and maybe some sleet. A flat, gray day.

Today in Madison? Six to ten inches of snow. Plus what fell last night and will continue to fall tonight. I'd be giddily excited if I didn't have to drive home through it tomorrow. (So, I suppose, I'm just "regular" excited.)