Word: homer
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Dates: during 1890-1899
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...Reading Homer at sight...
...Dialect and Verse of Homer...
These early poems brought Pope much praise but very little money; so in 1715, he began his translation of Homer as a commercial speculation. As he had no knowledge of Greek and was obliged to use Latin and French text, his translation is far from an exact one; in fact a friend remarked to him that he had produced a very good poem but he must not call it Homer's. The translation was, however, very successful, and with his fortune he bought the estate at Twickenham, called by Swift, "Pope's Villa...
Jealousy at the success of his Homer drew out much adverse comment from minor writers, and to crush them. Pope wrote his Dunciad. His epistles, moral essays and satires occupied his last fourteen years. His Essay on Man, although never regarded as of any philosophical value, shows well in its grace and smoothness of diction, the powers of the poet. His last years were given to didactic satires, in which he is without a rival...
...Scott's poems contain more of the Homeric or epic element than other poems in the English language." [Quoted from Principal Shairp's: The Homeric Spirit in Scott. Aspects of Poetry, p, 324. Contra, See Matthew Arnold's lectures on Homer (passion) in Essays in Criticism...