‘Odyssey’ Translator Emily Wilson Is Starting Over After Calling Christopher Nolan’s Blockbuster Film ‘Abysmal’
Nearly a decade after her acclaimed first translation was released, Wilson is taking a fresh approach to Homer’s ancient Greek epic
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Nine years after publishing the first complete English translation of Homer’s Odyssey by a woman—and several weeks after emerging as a vocal critic of this summer’s blockbuster film adaptation—Emily Wilson, a classicist at the University of Pennsylvania, has announced that she is retranslating the epic poem from scratch.
The undertaking, which she says is already about halfway complete, will be a wholesale retranslation rather than a revision of her earlier version, published in 2017 and widely praised by critics.
“I’m now retranslating The Odyssey from scratch, with an approach closer to that of my translation of The Iliad, using somewhat more lines than the original, enabling more varied word length and pacing,” Wilson says in a statement, the New York Times’ Neil Vigdor reports. “Also, I’ll have much more extensive endnotes.”
Wilson’s translation of The Iliad was published in 2023, and critics noted stylistic and tonal differences between that work and her rendering of The Odyssey.
“Her substantial introduction includes a fascinating account of the evolution of her Iliadic poetic voice, quite different from the more effervescent tone of her Odyssey,” the Guardian’s Edith Hall wrote in her review of Wilson’s Iliad following its publication. Hall also praised Wilson for providing “exceptionally rich resources for the reader, whether with previous knowledge of Homer or none: maps, a glossary, genealogies and 100 pages of explanatory notes.”
Did you know? Homeric Greek
- The language of Homer’s Odyssey is not the same as the Classical Greek spoken in Athens during the fifth century B.C.E.
- Homeric Greek is a distinctive literary language that combines forms from several Greek dialects and periods.
Kate Deimling, who oversees the literary division of the American Translators Association, says Wilson’s new project is practically unprecedented. “It’s not unheard of for translators to go back and make some corrections or edits in subsequent editions, but that’s not the same as a retranslation,” she tells the Associated Press’ Hillel Italie.
In recent weeks, it has been Wilson’s film criticism that has garnered widespread public attention. After her 2017 translation was cited by director Christopher Nolan as an inspiration for his adaptation of The Odyssey, released this summer, the book rocketed up the best-seller list. But Wilson has repeatedly criticized the hit film’s storytelling and plot.
“I would be ashamed to have written any part of this script,” she wrote in the London Review of Books in late July. “It lacks psychological, emotional, political and ethical depth. Its narrative structure is gimmicky. The writing is abysmal. None of the characters has convincing motivation for their actions or words. There are no sex scenes, and all the food looks horrible.”
Only a few details of Wilson’s retranslation, still a few years away from completion, are yet known. She tells the AP that she now thinks her original translation overused the word “slave” when more specific terms for different categories of enslaved people would have been more accurate.
Wilson says the opening sentence of her first translation—“Tell me about a complicated man,” which Nolan specifically cited—will “probably” remain unchanged.
“It’s always a huge privilege to get to spend all day reading Homer and wrestling with the endlessly fascinating challenges of how to convey ancient Greek into fluent English verse,” Wilson tells the Times.
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