NP "Speak, Memory"

[Dedalus]

Heikki Raudaskoski wrote:

> Take the opening lines of the epic. Nearly every translator sticks to the
> traditional Homeric invocation. Lattimore says, ''Tell me, Muse,'' and
> Robert Fagles, ''Sing to me of the man, Muse.'' But Lombardo opens with
> ''Speak, Memory.'' The decision to borrow the title of Vladimir Nabokov's
> autobiography is more than a poetic device. It underscores that the
> ''Odyssey'' is, at its core, about preserving memory."
>

That may be so, but does anyone else find Lombardo's take on this epic
convention somewhat disturbing?  I can certainly appreciate the subtle
allusion to Nabokov, not to mention the essence of "preserving memory" as an
underlying theme in _The Odyssey_, but to recast the invocation to the Muses
--- one of the primary conventions for any epic poet, right up there with the
epithets and the Homeric similes and the catalogs of arms, etc. --- to recast
the invocation as such seems to rob the genre of one of the things that gives
it its identity, so to speak.  It's like reshaping a Shakespearean drama into
three acts (genre convention), or putting quotation marks in Joyce's works, or
omitting biblical references in Melville (both stylistic conventions) --- it's
part of what makes these authors unique and these works exemplary.

I guess I'm just a purist when it comes to certain classic works . . . Of
course, Lombardo's use of a photo from the Battle of Normandy for his cover of
_The Iliad_ was quite cool!  Go figure me.

Happy New Year, all!

Dedalus