translationese

— Note on the Sources and Translations / Some of the works translated here are poetic in form. Hesiod, the hymnists, Lucretius, Vergil, and Horace, for example, all wrote in meter. I have not attempted to render these works metrically in English, and to capture all the irony, double-entendres, and wordplay of these texts was simply not possible, though I have striven to communicate some of their poetic qualities. In any event, at every turn I have studiously avoided translationese, while still trying to convey accurately what a given author actually wrote and meant. I hope I have succeeded, and also captured something of each writer's personality and charm.