When they are creative, translations and imitations can be the most revealing form of criticism. It is sometimes said that translation is the most intimate form of reading; successful translations are also highly expressive. The English-language heyday of classical verse translation, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, produced works that people still read, enjoy, and study today, beginning with English classics such as Alexander Pope’s Homer and John Dryden’s Virgil. Translation has been central in what we now call the reception of ancient poetry through the ages.

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