The Aeneid of Virgil

The recording offered here by Blackstone Audiobooks is an astonishing bargain. Frederick Davidson's unabridged (13-hour 11-CD) rendition of Jackson-Knight's classic prose translation of the Aeneid is well done and at a price that beggers belief. The only reason I hesitated before giving it a well-deserved five stars is that I personally found Davidson's delivery to be rather camp to my English ear, which did mean I had to listen for a while to tune into the words. Then it was wonderful.

A great new translation. Hold onto your copy of Fitzgerald, but don't hesitate to check out this new edition. This will be my go-to copy of The Aeneid. The book has a useful map, an informative forward, and a handy glossary and list of names. It also goes a long way towards capturing the timelessness of Virgil's poem. Simply put, I enjoyed it immensely and would recommend it to any reader. If you have never read Virgil (or Homer), then you need look no further for an illuminating, essential translation.

This is my first experience with The Aenid. This version reads easily and feels like most of the story is there. I would recommend if you want to get the general idea of this classic, although it is not as fun a read as something more modern.

Fagles is by far the best translator of ancient epics (see his work on the Iliad and Odyssey) The sacrifice of Latin pomp is well worth it because you get the full sense of the story and imagery​ Virgil was trying to convey.

These are all historical survivors because of their depth and integrity of content -- their placement in history. They are essential study to any serious reader and/or writer and historian/teacher. Enough can't be said to bring the point home. I'm still waiting for the arrival of Metamorphoses, though I perused a college library translation already. When you digest this kind of matter, you come to know the pride many take in higher, formal education; I work the museums in my area, so, on their field trips, I know the same is being taught now to younger grades, so same can be said for them. When universities were first created all levels prominently studied this kind of stuff. Think about that...

These are all historical survivors because of their depth and integrity of content -- their placement in history. They are essential study to any serious reader and/or writer and historian/teacher. Enough can't be said to bring the point home. I'm still waiting for the arrival of Metamorphoses, though I perused a college library translation already. When you digest this kind of matter, you come to know the pride many take in higher, formal education; I work the museums in my area, so, on their field trips, I know the same is being taught now to younger grades, so same can be said for them. When universities were first created all levels prominently studied this kind of stuff. Think about that...

This is a fine translation, but not my favourite. Mandelbaum is also accurate (often tighter to the original) and more of a poet. For instance,
Book V line 16: "Obliquatque sinus in ventum ac talia fatur" -- Fitzgerald: "He trimmed his fluttering canvas/More to catch the wind and said:"
This is not very close! Mandelbaum: "He trims the sails/To slant across the wind; his words are these:" This is much closer, and "To slant across the wind" is a nice phrase (though "His words are these" is clunky......).

Personally I think Virgil did a good job of showing he can write like Homer, even going so far as t parody characters from the Odyssey. Other than that he shows a lot of influence in glorifying the history of Rome so it was an enjoyable read in my opinion and a good classic to have.

The Aeneid is a classic of Western literature, so after re-reading The Odyssey again a few months ago, I decided to tackle The Aeneid, which I had read in college and had thought was okay at the time, again. Alas, Virgil's 19 BC epic poem just doesn't work for me as well. While The Odyssey is a huge favorite of mine, I just couldn't get into The Aeneid. Part of it was the book itself, and part of it was likely the translation I listened to, John Dryden's 1697 verse translation.

The basic plot is that Trojan hero Aeneas sails the Mediterranean, stops off in Carthage where he hooks up with Queen Dido, then he dumps her, sails to Italy, kills a bunch of people, and becomes founder of Rome. It should be a good story, but it just doesn't click with me. None of the characters are anyone I can really care about. In The Odyssey, Homer manages to make you care about Odysseus, Telemachus, Penelope, and others. Virgil, however, seems much more focused on showing that Aeneas is awesome (which, given that the poem was produced for Augustus Caesar, who claimed decent from Aeneas, makes sense), and instead it just falls flat.

As mentioned, I listened to John Dryden's 1697 translation. This was probably a mistake, and I probably would have been better off with a prose translation. Virgil wrote the poem in rhyming couplets, which Dryden's translation mirrors. However, it was very hard for me to listen to the reading and focus on the story. I kept getting caught up in the rhymes, and wondering ten minutes later what had just happened. The reader (who I'll get to in a moment) was great, so I don't blame him. I just think it's a hard format to write in while also keeping the story in focus, as the poet or translator has to make a lot of contortions to keep the rhyming going. It also seemed that Dryden made his translation to look good on a page, more than sound good being read. There were a lot of instances of jarringly contorted rhymes like:

Not one of those my hand shall toss in vain
Against our foes, on this contended plain."
He said; then seiz'd a mighty spear, and threw;
Which, wing'd with fate, thro' Maeon's buckler flew,

...which looks great on the page. But when you listen to it, it comes across as "blah blah blah vain blah blah blah plain HE SAID blah blah threw blah blah blah flew. The line break "He said"s are frequent, and just seemed like a lazy way to keep the pace of the written rhyme, without any thought given to how it actually sounded to the ear. There were many instances of great lines, but ones like the above just killed the flow for me.

I listened to Tantor Unabridged Classics' 2010 production, read by Michael Page. Page himself was a joy to listen to. He has a great voice and does as good a job as anyone could in keeping the 13 unabridged hours of rhyming listenable. I first heard Page reading the role of John Seward in Brilliance Audio's 1994 production of Bram Stoker's Dracula, and I enjoyed him in that. After listening him perform an entire work, I've added him to my list of preferred audio book narrators.

I can't really give The Aeneid, or at least Dryden's translation of it, an endorsement. The plot is lackluster, the rhyming in the translation distracts from the story, and it's hard to listen to 13 hours of rhyming verses. Page, however, did a great job in the narration. If you're looking for an ancient classic to listen to, I'd recommend Tantor Unabridged Classics' 2009 production of The Odyssey by Homer, featuring Samuel Butler's 1898 prose translation and narrated by Simon Prebble instead. The Odyssey, with eBook (Tantor Unabridged Classics)

The translation is at the same time literal and not literal. Some word choices are very literal, but the sentence structure feels like it is often polished up a little more into English. If that's what you want, then this is a good book. But if you want it for literal translation (I'm an AP Latin student and that's what we need), this is just okay. It gives a general idea of the story, but is not close to a full and literal translation.

Virgil's Aeneid translated by Robert Fagles is alive with contemporary vigor. The Romans came into their own in this tale which we all ought to know. Read the text and enjoy Simon Callow's audio interpretation with your children! Expose a new generation to a classic epic poem which will bring life-long enrichment.

Oh, man, this translation is a royal slog. And of course because it's Kindle, illustrations are just useless (they don't look like anything beyond some blobs and you can't zoom in on them for clarity).

I would LOVE to hear from poetry lovers if there is a really lyrical translation out there. I am in by less than 100 pages and I'm continuing this only due to personal obsession to finish any book I start. Your kind responses suggesting a good translation are welcome here. Thanks

This version, translated by C. Day Lewis, is more than passable, but not up to the standard of Robert Fagles. The audio recording also suffers from using an aging Jill Balcon, who for some reason was not only cast for female roles, but the god Mercury. For goddesses such as Venus and Juno, one would expect to hear the voices of 20-year old women, not the craggy voice of an older woman or women. Paul Scofield relentlessly reads the text, but completely lacks the force of Derek Jacobi in the Iliad and Odyssey. Jacobi's rendition of Hermes (Mercury) is that of a cheery lad, not the angry god who prods the wandering Aeneas ever onward.

I realize Virgil uses the Roman names of the gods, but I would have been more comfortable coming from hearing the Iliad and going right into the Aeneid using the Greek names. The continuity would have been better.

All in all, this version is okay seeing nothing better is available, but Mercury riding the sky's "breezes" I think would have been better rendered "winds."

It's a remarkable story and one I wish Jacobi would do. But it's easy to get spoiled after listening to him. No one else can come close, though Toby Stphens himself is far better than Scofield.

Well, you get the book for Kindle. The audiobook, however, requires downloading a separate iOS or android app, which then requires a separate download from Archive.org, and that didn't work. So if you're buying this for the audiobook, be aware that you may well not get it. I didn't.

Later: I started to read the book on the Kindle. Every few pages there is an ad for the audiobook and app. If you want to put up with interruptions and read a very mediocre text, then certainly buy this book.

The price and the quality just can't compare. For a cheap price the book was simply in awesome condition. There is only one fault that I can find from this buyer though. The buyer wraps the book poorly. This does not effect the condition of the book in anyway during shipping though. However, you better pray that the package doesn't arrive to your doorstep when it is raining. Due to poor wrapping rain water will leak through leaving your once awesome book into a blue inky mess. Learned from experience. The rain leaked into my book but I caught it in time to have little to minimal damage. Other than that this buyer is awesome.

Laborious, rhyming translation from a few hundred years ago (NOT Fitzgerald's translation as some reviews would lead the buyer to believe). Worth looking (and paying) for a more recent, updated translation like Fitzgerald. the store's reviews on The Aeneid are all mixed up but minus a short, decent intro this Aeneid is the same as the free kindle version.

I purchased this book because we had checked it out from the library and I wanted a copy for ourselves in hardback. The translation has been fine for my son's schoolwork. However, he has still been reading the copy from the library. I believe the used copy was rated at least as good and did not indicate that it had writings or markings on the inside. I may be mistaken, but I was not pleased to find things highlighted and underlined in the text. It wouldn't have bothered me nearly as much if it had at least been done neatly, but it was messy looking. This was a book that I had intended to put on my shelf and loan to others if they needed to borrow it, but not sure now.