The Aeneid?

Question

Does anyone know of a website that puts the Aeneid into plain english line by line? I have the 'translated' version but it is still a little hard for me to understand. I also have a few summaries of Book VI but I am more looking for a line by line today's english version of Book VI? Thanks for your help!

I wasn't really looking for a discussion of the use of 'slang'. I would just like to better understand the Aeneid and not to be mislead in my reading.

Answer 1

Hey. Kudos for you for keeping on and not just giving up on a great work of literature.

There are MANY different translations out there. Some are older, some are newer. Each translator has a different purpose and focus-- some really want to put it into "plain modern English", and some are really interested in being an exact translation from the Latin into English line for line, and some are interested in making their own great poem in English based on Virgil's poem. So you need to look around.

Here are some good strategies:
1. Go to your local college (even if you are not in college right now, they will still help you) or public library. Ask for a reference librarian. Tell them you want to see all the copies of the Aeneid they have. (If they are a pretty good size library, chances are they will have several.) Open the copies up to the same passage and read them all next to each other. Pick the one that makes most sense to you.

2. If you can't get to the library, go to Amazon.com or another online bookseller that lets you search inside the book. Look at each one and see if one is better. Robert Fagles' translation looks like a good one to me for you.

3. I have found that the BEST thing when reading things like Homer, Virgil, or Shakespeare is to simply read it out loud. Or get a friend and read it out loud to each other. They were originally meant to be heard alound, never read in silence. This makes a HUGE difference. Read it slowly, pausing at commas and stopping at periods, but DON'T stop at line breaks unless they end in a period. The ends of lines should mean nothing to you. Every twenty or thirty lines, stop and sort of sum up to yourself or each other. "So they get out of the city and he's carrying his dad on his back."; "So they were about to sacrifice on this hill and then he realizes that the roots of the trees have grown up through DEAD BODIES! Yuck!!"

4. If your library has it, or you can afford to buy it, you can also get it on cd.

Good luck. Really. Try the out loud thing. It's also fun to have a party and have everyone dress in togas and do a few pages.

Answer 2

I know what you mean. I also hear this a lot from people who (forgive me if this offends) do not take the time to really learn to speak English. It is as if they are meaning to say, can you translate shakespear into ghetto slang. It is the only reason i can see a distinction being made between English, and Plain English. Aren't they both English, or is plain English full of "you know what im sayin"'s.

I swear this is not hate it just brought up the question for me. I do not think there is a "plain" English version of anything academic. But wait a few years, some of those slang terms could make it into our language if enough people use them with regularity and simmilarity.

Answer 3

i dont know of a website, but there is a copy of it by Penguin Classics which I've read
it's still not in the sort of english we'd use, but it's not too bad.
i tried reading the direct translation and found it v.difficult to understand, but there is a book u can get to read as you go along, with explanations of some of the names and places in it, so that u know some basic background information while your reading it, which helps a bit
personally, i'd say the Penguin Classics book is a better option though, as i'm 15 and i managed to read it without too much difficulty. i have only read the VI book though, so i'm not sure what the rest of it is like ...
hope this helps!

Answer 4

I have an e-text copy of the Aeneid. I can send it to you as a zip file or a txt file. Click on my Avatar and send me an Answers e-mail with your regular e-mail address--while you're there check out the amount of "Fans" so you know I'm legit--files can't be attached to YA e-mail. I'll send the Aeneid as an attachment to the regular e-mail address.

You can do a "find" in an e-text and that beats out a paper book everytime.

Answer 5

Hello,
To Tinderno- ditto!

Michael Kelly