{
  "full": "\n**HOMER. THE ILIAD. 1929–1982. (ML 166)**  \n\n#### 186.1a. First printing (1929)  \n\n[within double rules] THE | ILIAD OF HOMER | [rule] | DONE INTO ENGLISH PROSE | BY | ANDREW LANG WALTER LEAF | ERNEST MYERS | [rule] | [torchbearer A2] | [rule] | THE MODERN LIBRARY | PUBLISHERS : NEW YORK  \n\nPp. [*6*], 1–464 [465–466]. [1–14]16 [15]12  \n\n[*1*] half title; [*2*] pub. note D5; [*3*] title; [*4*] *First Modern Library Edition* | 1929 | [short double rule]; [*5*] PREFATORY NOTE; [*6*] poem signed: A. L.; poem signed: E. M.; 1–464 text; [465] poem signed: W. L.; [466] blank.  \n\n*Jacket A:* Uniform typographic jacket D. (*Fall 1929*)  \n\n*Jacket B:* Pictorial in moderate red (15) and black on yellow paper with illustration of Achilles with spear and shield and Troy in flames in background; title and borders in moderate red, other lettering in black. Unsigned but probably by Staloff, the designer of the companion jacket for *The Odyssey* (187.1a jacket B). (*Fall 1931*)  \n\n> Front flap:\nOf the books of antiquity which adorn the Modern Library series, none is in greater favor than Homer’s *Iliad* and its companion volume, *The Odyssey* (No. 167). The immortal epic of the wrath of Achilles and the siege of Troy is as vivid to the contemporary reader as it must have been to Homer’s first enraptured listeners seven centuries before the Christian era, and as it has remained through the ages in its various renderings. The Lang-Leaf-Myers translation was chosen upon the urgent advice of the leading authorities in England and America. (*Spring 1936*)  \n\nLang-Leaf-Myers translation originally published in U.S. by the Macmillan Co., 1883. ML edition printed from plates made from a new typesetting. Published December 1929. *WR* not found. First printing: Not ascertained. Superseded fall 1964 by Rees translation (186.2).  \n\nThe ML originally planned to use the 17th-century translations of George Chapman for its editions of Homer’s *Iliad* and *Odyssey*. Advance advertising referred to the Chapman translations, as did fall 1929 catalogs and ML lists—including the lists inside first printings of the Homer jackets. The Lang-Leaf-Myers translation of *The Iliad* and the Butcher and Lang translation of *The Odyssey* were substituted at the last moment on the advice of several college professors. “We discovered that we could sell five times as many books in the new translation as we could have had we used the Chapman, since the Lang, Leaf, and Myers one is used in almost all of the colleges” (Cerf to George M. McKanday, Macmillan Co. of Canada, 25 November 1930).  \n\nThe Prefatory Note (p. [*5*]) indicates that Books I–IX were translated by Leaf, X–XVI by Lang, and XVII–XXIV by Myers, but that the whole was revised by all three translators.  \n\nThe ML hoped to use Macmillan plates, but Macmillan had to secure approval from its parent firm in London and was unable to make a solid offer until the end of October. By that time the ML had begun composition so that the books could be published in December.  \n\n*The Iliad* ranked in the middle of the second quarter of ML titles during the 18-month period May 1942–October 1943 and rose into the lower part of the first quarter during the 12-month period November 1951–October 1952. Sales totaled 122,292 copies by spring 1958.  \n\n#### 186.1b. Title page reset (c. 1941)  \n\nTHE ILIAD | OF | HOMER | DONE INTO ENGLISH PROSE | BY | ANDREW LANG WALTER LEAF | ERNEST MYERS | [torchbearer E2 at right; 3-line imprint at left] THE | MODERN LIBRARY | NEW YORK | [rule]  \n\nPp. [*6*], 1–464 [465–474]. [1–15]16. Contents as 186.1a except: [*2*] publication and manufacturing statements within single rules; [467–472] ML list; [473–474] ML Giants list. (*Spring 1944*)  \n\n*Jacket:* Non-pictorial in dark red (16) on cream paper with lettering and torchbearer in reverse against solid dark red background. Designed by Joseph Blumenthal. \n\n> Front flap as 186.1a jacket B. (*Spring 1943*)  \n\n#### 186.1c. Highet introduction added (1950)  \n\nTHE ILIAD | OF HOMER | TRANSLATED BY | ANDREW LANG, WALTER LEAF | AND ERNEST MEYERS [*sic*] | [short swelled rule] | INTRODUCTION BY GILBERT HIGHET | PROFESSOR OF GREEK AND LATIN | COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY | [torchbearer E5] | THE MODERN LIBRARY · NEW YORK  \n\nPp. [i–iv] v–xvi, 1–464. [1–15]16  \n\n[i] half title; [ii] blank; [iii] title; [iv] *Copyright, 1950, by Random House, Inc.*; v–xiv INTRODUCTION | By Gilbert Highet; xv–xvi WORKS IN ENGLISH | ABOUT THE HOMERIC POEMS; 1–464 text.  \n\n> *Variant:* Pp. [i–iv] v–xiv [xv–xvi], 1–464. Collation as 186.1c. Contents as 186.1c except: [xv–xvi]. *Note:* Page numerals “xv” and “xvi” removed from plates.  \n\n*Jacket:* As 186.1b. Front flap as 186.1a jacket B. (*Spring 1950*) Front flap reset with last sentence slightly revised. (*Spring 1957*)  \n\nHighet received \\$300 for his introductions to *The Iliad* and *The Odyssey* (Stein to Highet, 26 January 1950). The first section of the introductions (“The World of the *Iliad* and the *Odyssey*”) is common to both volumes, as is the bibliography. Highet’s introductions were also included in printings of *The Iliad* and *The Odyssey* in Modern Library College Editions, which were introduced in fall 1950. Most of the introductions written for MLCE appeared first in that series and were subsequently added to regular ML printings.  \n\nThe Prefatory Note and the poems on pp. [*6*] and [465] of 186.1a–b are omitted from 186.1c.  \n\nMyers’s name was misspelled on the reset title page. Highet pointed out the error shortly after publication (Highet to Crary, 8 September 1950). There is a memo in the RH Papers ordering the correction on the MLCE title page. The title page of the regular ML edition does not appear to have been corrected.  \n\n#### 186.2. Rees translation (1964)  \n\nTHE | ILIAD | OF | HOMER | TRANSLATED BY | ENNIS REES | [torchbearer J] | THE MODERN LIBRARY | NEW YORK  \n\nPp. [i–iv] v–xiv, [1–2] 3–529 [530]. [1]16 [2–8]32 [9–10]16  \n\n[i] half title; [ii] dedication; [iii] title; [iv] © Copyright, 1963, by Ennis Rees; v–vi CONTENTS; vii–xii INTRODUCTION signed p. xii: ENNIS REES; xiii–xiv SELECTED | BIBLIOGRAPHY; [1] fly title; [2] blank; 3–516 text; 517–529 INDEX; [530] blank.  \n\n*Jacket:* Pictorial in grayish yellowish brown (80), brilliant yellow (83) and black on coated white paper with line of Greek soldiers in brilliant yellow looming over a stone wall represented by intersecting black lines; lettering in reverse and black, all against grayish yellowish brown background.  \n\n> Front flap:\nWith the publication of *The Iliad*, Ennis Rees has completed the monumental work of translating all of Homer into natural, free-flowing verse, and he has fulfilled the promise of his brilliant translation of *The Odyssey*. > The tale of heroes and gods who fought the Trojan War is now available in a translation at once faithful to the superb original and extremely accessible to the contemporary reader.  \n\nRees translation originally published by Random House, 1963. ML edition (pp. v–529) printed from RH plates with the dedication and title page adapted from the RH printing. Published fall 1964. *WR* 16 November 1964. First printing: Not ascertained. Discontinued 1982/83.  \n\nEpstein wanted to include Richmond Lattimore’s verse translation of *The Iliad* in the ML in 1960, but reprint rights do not appear to have been available (Epstein to Roger Shugg, University of Chicago Press, 6 January 1960). RH published Rees’s verse translation of *The Odyssey* later that year, followed by his verse translation of *The Iliad* in 1963. Rees’s volumes were designed so that the plates could be used for ML printings.  \n\nThe ML title page reproduces the title exactly as it appears in the RH printing, but the statement of responsibility for the translator (TRANSLATED BY | ENNIS REES) and the imprint are reduced in size, significantly improving the balance and aesthetic appeal of the ML title page. The dedication facing the title page is reduced from four lines in the RH printing (THIS TRANSLATION | IS DEDICATED | TO JEFFREY, AMY, | AND ANDREW) to two lines (TO JEFFREY, AMY, | AND ANDREW) in the ML.  \n\nAlso in the Modern Library  \nHomer, *The Odyssey* (1929–1971) 187  \nHomer, *Complete Works* (1935–1973) G18  \n\n",
  "id": "186",
  "year": "1929",
  "label": "HOMER. THE ILIAD. 1929–1982. (ML 166)",
  "author": "HOMER",
  "title": "THE ILIAD.",
  "date": "1929–1982.",
  "something": "ML 166",
  "revisions": [],
  "type": "book"
}