At some point near the beginning of 2025 I decided that I’d try to get through as many epics as I could, though I didn’t spend much time defining what I meant by epic. Is it something ancient and narrative? Is it merely any big book? With this hesitant definition and even more tentative ambition, I started compiling a chronological list. Oh, and my singular criterion: there had to be an easily available audio book edition. Here’s what I came up with:
- Gilgamesh
- Iliad
- Odyssey
- Aeneid
- Beowulf
- Poetic Edda
- Tale of Genji
- El Cid
- Divine Comedy
- The Decameron
- Sir Gawain & the Green Knight
- Canterbury Tales
- Faerie Queene
- Don Quixote
- Paradise Lost
I couldn’t find an audio book of Gilgamesh, so I started with the Homeric epics. Right out of the gate, I hated the Iliad. Despite having read excerpts and studying the history and mythology over more than forty years, this is the first time I went, as it were, from cover to cover. The narrative is practically nonexistent. All the characters, including the gods, are assholes. There is so little plot. Get it together, Homer. The most interesting part of the Trojan War is the story of the horse, but nuh-uh: no horse here. Just an over abundance of gore and violence.
Thankfully, instead of right away abandoning my plan, I forced myself to continue on with the Odyssey, which, despite the translator’s terrible decision to “translate” the names of the Greek gods into Roman, had enough plot and character development to hold my interest. Although the tedious tale of the suitors, which makes up probably more than a third of the story, bored me to no end.
The Aeneid wasn’t accessible, so I skipped ahead to Beowulf, where I was thrilled to linger a bit. I started with the R.K. Gordon translation, which I enjoyed very much. Because I became more intrigued about Old English, I concurrently listened to Hana Videen’s The Wordhord, which was everything a book about language should be. Then I gave in and sampled Maria Dahvana Headley’s translation of Beowulf. There are so many ways that this translation could’ve been strained and hokey, but that was not the case. I wanted to savor it all. Wow. I felt every syllable, almost growing faint with the acute alliteration. And her masterly introduction should be studied by translators. I’ve already recommended this translation to three people. Bro.
Again, it’s been difficult to source audio books of the Poetic Edda, The Tale of Genji, and El Cid, so I moved on with Dante’s Divine Comedy. This book aged me twenty years with its shoddy geography, shoddy theology, shoddy numerology, and shoddy astronomy. Such a prissy, precious little thing. Fuck Dante. This is one text I’ll never have a reason to revisit.
In the meantime, I’ve found versions of Gilgamesh and the Poetic Edda, so I’ll circle back around to listen to them before moving on through the Middle Ages.