Research Introduction

My research aims to identify the differences in how a male translator versus a female translator of the Iliad and the Odyssey, the two epic poems produced by the Greek poet Homer, portray women through an analysis of the evaluative adjectives employed to describe each female character. In doing so, I intend to identify a net positive, negative, or neutral portrayal of the women of the Iliad and the Odyssey in order to determine if a literal, misogynistic model is employed in the analysis and translation of Homeric epic poetry. 

The women of Ancient Greece lack representation in the historical accounts of society and politics beyond Athens, and most of what is understood about the women of the era was derived from literature most often written by male authors. Over the centuries, many male-translated versions of the Homeric epics have been published in English, the most recent of which being Robert Fagles's Iliad and Odyssey, published in 1990 and 1996, respectively. However, only one woman has written and published an English translation of both epics: Emily Wilson, a professor of Classical Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, whose Iliad was published in 2023 and whose Odyssey was published in 2018. As such, no research exists comparing the two Homeric epics regarding their portrayal of women.

Abstract

This study evaluates the portrayal of women in male-authored versus female-authored translations of Homer’s Iliad to determine if gender bias is included in the translation of Homeric epic poetry. Due to the value Homer’s epic poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey, hold as the basis of Greek education and their influence on values limiting women’s social influence in ancient Athens, the portrayal of women in the Homeric epics likely contributes to values influencing the role of women in contemporary society. Through an analysis of Robert Fagles’s Iliad as the selected male-translated version and Emily Wilson’s Iliad as the selected female-translated version with an emphasis placed on evaluative adjectives, each translation was assessed for the total number of positive, neutral, and negative instances of evaluation to determine the manner in which female characters were most often portrayed in each gendered translation. Due to the novelty of Emily Wilson’s translation of the Iliad (2023), research has not yet been conducted on the portrayal of women between a male-translated version and a female-translated version of the text. The results indicated that the selected male-translated version of the Iliad contained more negative portrayals of women at 37.79%, whereas the selected female-translated version of the Iliad contained a majority of neutral portrayals at 46.85%, confirming the initial hypothesis. Further research comparing male-translated and female-translated versions of Homer’s Odyssey are highly encouraged to expand upon the portrayal of women in gendered translations of Homeric poetry.

Keywords: Ancient Greece, Portrayal of Women in Ancient Greek Literature, Women, Homer, Evaluative Adjectives