Lucretius on the Nature of Things. Translated by Cyril Bailey

By Cryil Tr. Lucretius. Bailey

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• Format: Hardcover
• ISBN: B00AYPFKP6
• Release Date: January 1929
• Publisher: Clarendon P.

Customer Reviews

Translator Cyril Bailey Born: April 13, 1871, Kensington, London

Just as in the Iliad by Homer, the translation can make a significant difference in what you are reading. With “De Rerum natura” or “The Nature of Things” by Lucretius, a glaring difference is that the word “matter” can also be the word “atom,” depending on the translation. I will not go through the different translations here, but you need to be aware and probably try different translations. My favorite translation is “New Verse Translation” by Ian Johnston. It looks like the sample shown for the Kindle is this translation. If you can find it, Hugh Ross reads a good 7-CD version. Some Kindle versions have text-to-speak. Titus Lucretius Carus, born around 99 BCE, has a good handle on “The Nature of Things,” a poem written in some 7,400 dactylic hexameters, and he makes a good argument for the existence of things and how they work. He goes on to dabble in all things from celestial and terrestrial phenomena. He had to do this without knowing that the 21st century has instruments and ways to know more than our senses with accuracy and application. He would not know of the quantum world. I suspect this book was on Darwin’s bedside table.