Friday, October 3.1997
The University Daily Kansan
4
Section A • Page 3
Modern 'Iliad' marches against apathy
By Emily C. Forsyth
Words such as "goddamn" and "gutless wonder" did not appear in Homer's "Iliad," but professor of classics Stanley Lombardo included these words in his translation of the work to bring the story alive.
Lombardo, chairman of the classics department, recently released, his contemporary translation of the
had," the result of a more than 30 years of work.
Lombardo's quest to translate the epic began in 1962 at Loyola University in New Orleans when he was first inspired by Homer's poetic intensity.
"Iliad": Lombardo wrote the above translation.
Lombardo has been actively working on the translation for the past 10 years. Lombardo said he used a contemporary and colloquial voice to make the characters seem believable to his audience.
"It's easy to embalm a classic," Lombardo said. "But to bring it back to life again—right now—that's something else, and that's what I was trying to do."
On the cover of Lombardo's book is a photograph of Allied soldiers landing on Normandy beach on D-Day. Lombardo said the photograph set up the analogy between the Homeric world and the 20th century American world.
"The specific analogy is the Trojan War and World War II, that somehow these two wars for our respective cultures were defining events." he said.
Daniel Mendelssohn of the New York Times Book Review wrote
Lombardo's translation, published in April 1997 by Hackett Publishing Co. Inc. of Indianapolis, has been well-received by critics.
favorably of Lombardo's book, calling it "a vivid and sometimes disarmingly hard-bitten reworking of a great classic."
Kenneth Irby, lecturer in the department of English, said he was impressed with Lombardo's translation both read aloud and on the page. Irby and several other faculty members spent a day at the Kansas Union last spring reading aloud from the book.
"It's been tried and tested, and I think
that shows in the excellence of it," Irbv said.
Stanley Lombardo, chairman of the department of classics, recently released his contemporary translation of the "Iliad." Lombardo has been actively working on his translation for the past 10 years.
Lombardo included his book in the curriculum of a mythology class he taught this summer, and the book is being adopted as a textbook for other college classes nationwide. His text is one of four translations of the "Iliad" that are widely used at the university level.
The National Public Radio show
Now, Lombardo is working on a
translation of Homer's the "Oddysey," which he said he hoped to complete within the next year or two.
"One epic at a time," Lombardo said.
This engineering class really is child's play
By Daniel E. Thompson
dthompson@kansan.com
Kansan staff writer
Today's lesson is everyday levers.
You know, like bottle openers, hammers and brooms. Next week, we are making bean catapults, so study hard.
This class is Engineering/ Physics 514 at the University of Kansas. Not quite
the taxing curriculum our future physicists and fabricators should have?
Think again. It is not easy, and it serves an important purpose. The class is Technical/Science Communication to Non-Technical Populations and the 11 students enrolled are the ones teaching — to elementary students.
"The public now demands to know
what their tax dollars are being spent on," said Chandra Graves, free-lance science writer. "As college students are educated in their chosen fields of interest, their language becomes their largon of trade."
Engineering student Delano Sheffield, Topeka junior, shares his knowledge of levers with Ellen Schwien's sixth-grade class at Wakarusa Elementary School. Sheffield teaches as part of Engineering/Physics 514. Photo by Laurie Fleckloll/Kansan
Graves said problems arose when a scientist or engineer tried to explain what they were doing to a layperson.
The University solved the problem by creating ENGR/PHSX 514 to help scientists learn to communicate better. Their listeners are third-through sixth-graders at Lawrence elementary schools.
"Engineering is a lot of math formulas and numbers," said Tim Duman, coordinator for the class and Ph.D. student. "But in the classroom, those are no longer helpful."
Scientists and engineers must learn to effectively communicate what is happening in the world without using the technical information they rely on.
That doesn't come easy. Mark Anderson, Fargo, N.D., senior in civil engineering, teaches Caroline Montey's sixth-graders three weeks a week.
"I'm teaching science to people who don't have the background I do." Anderson said. "It helps me to learn where I need to start."
That means not mentioning the radius of the lever to determine the
orque as a function of force times distance.
"He's learned as he's gone what size bites to the give kids," said Montey.
Monkey said that Anderson came to the Open House Sept. 23, and the parents already had heard about him.
"Obviously, the students have gone home enthusked about it," she said.
The elementary students are getting a peek into what it is like to be an engineer. DeLano Sheffield, Topeka junior, drew a bottle to try to figure out where the fulcrum was in a bottle opener.
"Scientists and engineers are always drawing pictures," Duman said.
Duman said many of the students enrolled were engineers, who substitute it for an elective. The civil engineering department will consider petitions to substitute the class for COMS 130.
However, some sequences don't allow the students to substitute ENGR/PHSX 514 for other classes.
But the best part of the class isn't learning to communicate effectively and get a better job.
"It's fun to think like a kid for an hour." Anderson said.
"And get away with it," Sheffield added.
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The University of Kansas School of Fine Arts Lied Center Swarthout Chamber Music Series Presents
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