At 12:17 PM 23/01/98 -0800, you wrote: >Well, Pound preferred Arthur Golding's Ovid, and it's worth a look >just for that. > >Of shapes transformde to bodies straunge, I purpose to entreate, >Ye gods vouchsafe (for you are they ywrought this wondrous feate) >To further is mine enterprise. And from the wrold begunne, >Graunt that my verse may to my time, his course directly runne. >Before the Sea and Lande were made, and Heaven that all doth hide, >In all the worlde one onely face of nature did abide, >Which Chaos hight, a huge rude heape, and nothing else but even >A heavie lump and clottred clod of seedes togither driven, >Of things at strife among themselves, for want of order due. >No sunne as yet with lightsome beames the shapelesse world did view. >No moone in growing did repayre hir hornes with borowed light. > >Compare that to Humphries' > >My intention is to tell of bodies changed >To different forms; the gods, who made the changes, >will help me --or I hope so-- with a poem >That runs from the world's beginning to our own days. >Before the ocean was, or earth, or heaven, >Nature was all alike, a shapelessness, >Chaos, so-called, all rude and lumpy matter, >Nothing but bulk, inert, in whose confusion >Discordant atoms warred: there was no sun >To light the universe; there was no moon >With slender silver crescents filling slowly... > >Of course, Humphries hadn't done his when Pound made his choice. >Golding is musical and leisurely. Humphries speeds along. I don't >think Pound was interested in getting the Latin right, mind you, but >in translating, and in music. > >--Harold Rhenisch >[log in to unmask] Please remove me from your mailing list. Thank you Ann Smith.