Charles Boer's translation was nominated for a National Book Award. The Homeric Hymns are among the most important documents we have of Greek mythology. These poems treat the gods and goddesses individually, setting down the language by which they were known and addressed, and telling the stories of their encounters with each other and with mortals. Composed after Homer &mdash in his style &mdash they offer a view of the Greek mythic world from the 7th century B.C. into the Alexandrian period. The hymns return what myth handbooks inevitably lose &mdash the gaiety and dread of people speaking of and to the countenances of the divine.

Charles Boer's translation is literal, but his poetic form and his language are contemporary and idiomatic. Using a variety of open measures, he makes new for us the poetic wonder and excitement of the originals. Boer's extremely clear, unornamented style restores to the Greek formulas &mdash those habitual epithets which often seem odd to the modern reader &mdash the sense that they are necessary to shared wonder and reverent song.

Also Available: Charles Olson in Connecticut and Spring (several different volumes in the series); Translator: Ovid's Metamorphoses