E. V. Rieu

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Dr. E.V. Rieu— in full Emile Victor Rieu (1887–1972)— is best known for his lucid translations of Homer, as editor of Penguin Classics, and for a modern translation of the four Gospels, which evolved from his role as editor of a projected (but aborted) Penguin translation of the Bible. His translation of the Odyssey, 1946, was the opener of the Penguin Classics, a series that he edited from 1944 to 1964. He also translated Virgil.

Patrick Kavanagh evoked the translations' crisp and readable character in a poem "On Looking into E. V. Rieu's Homer"

"In stubble fields the ghosts of corn are

The important spirits the imagination heeds.

Nothing dies; there are no empty

Spaces in the cleanest-reaped fields."

The genial and witty Rieu was a friend and editorial mentor of the science fiction writer Olaf Stapledon. His son, D.C.H. Rieu, has revised his translations. Rieu is less known for his children's verse, (Cuckoo Calling: a book of verse for youthful people, 1933) and was influential in the development of Oxford University Press in the early 20th century.

The sole contemporary rival to his prose translation of the Iliad was the verse translation of Richmond Lattimore.

Bible translation running in the family, another of his sons, C. H. Rieu, translated "The Acts of the Apostles by Saint Luke" which was published by Penguin in 1957.

Notes

References

• "Translating the Gospels: A Discussion Between Dr. E.V. Rieu and the Rev. J.B. Phillips" Interview of 3 December 1953.
• E.V. Rieu, "Hall and Knight" A hilarious account of the production of the textbook, Hall and Knight's Elementary Algebra for Schools, first published in Rieu's collected verse, Cuckoo Calling (London:Methuen) 1933)

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