The Aeneid holds a special place in the history of English translation. The Aeneid seems to be something major translators turn to only when they have run out of Homer or Dante and still need something meaty to get their chops into. The shopworn copy of blurbers, “long-awaited,” leans, for once, in the direction of understatement. Robert Fagles, after his acclaimed translations of The Iliad and The Odyssey, has now turned his attention to this more problematic work. Robert Fitzgerald’s elegant rendition of The Aeneid, the standard text, has been the reigning champion for more than 20 years and can buy a drink without getting carded.
If that is so, we are in need of a new Aeneid. Thomas Jefferson’s assertion that “every generation needs a new revolution” has long been adopted by translators it is a commonplace that every generation needs a new Homer, a new Virgil, a new Dante. The Aeneid by Virgil, translated by Robert Fagles, Viking, $40
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