Oft of one wide expanse had I been toldThat deep-browed Homer ruled as his demesne;Yet did I never breathe its pure sereneTill I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold -John Keats, On First Looking into Chapman's Homer Chapman's versions inspired English poets for centuries after his time. They rest on a minute and perceptive reading of ... Read morethe texts. And they retain their power to fascinate and provoke anyone interested in Homer and his afterlife, in Renaissance ideas about classical and modern poetry, or in the development of the language of English poetry. -Anthony T. Grafton, Princeton University It should be very satisfying to sing hymns to gods whom everyone can agree exist, so tune up your pipes for Apollo, the archer and fair king of days, or for Venus, the soft skinned, because both beauty and sunshine deserve our adoration. How appropriate that the voice you can choose here should be Elizabethan, queen of the Enlightenment, and patron of the poets, George Chapman so much among them, who made the old world new, and heard the voice of heroes in all of Homer's songs. -William H. Gass Show Less