> Donald Carne-Ross, commissioning for the BBC, started Christopher Logue off
> on his versions of The Iliad in 1963 with Patrocleia which became the first
> section of the War Music book. Christopher Logue, now 77, has spent 40
> years working on his translations and has now published his fourth book.
> Reading through the four books they are quite consistent in their quality.
> Christopher Logue works from cribs as he has no Greek. Seeing I have just
> spent three hours reading them this evening I thought I would recommend
> them.
Reading Graves' _Greek Myths_, vol. i, which I picked up for 50p in the
waiting room of the Great Eastern Railway station at Leicester, I was put in
mind of how much Graves' star seems to have waned. Opinions might reasonably
differ as to whether this is a good or a bad thing. I don't have any of
Graves' poems irremovably welded to the inside of my consciousness, but maybe
I just haven't met the right poem. I have no idea whether or how seriously
Graves' _Greek Myths_ might be misleading me, but it is a good read all the
same.
Some of _War Music_ *has* stayed with me, I think because Logue is unafraid of
bringing out the showy pyrotechnics when they are called for and has a superb
sense of narrative pace, yet beneath it all something subtle and icy and
penetrating can sometimes be felt to move. There is a coldness and cleverness
in there that is at least as thrilling as the racy stuff, if like me you
enjoy that kind of thing.
Dominic
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