Letter from the Editors

When we speak about departures, we are often talking about the beginning of a new adventure, but we also know that every departing contains a parting: a farewell that divides us from where and who we were before. As a title, this word lends a convenient ambiguity to the first issue of a journal dedicated to introducing readers to the past through translation.

In starting Ancient Exchanges, we envision as our destination a space without the strict boundaries that have been built between academic disciplines, between the creative and the scholarly. We wish to challenge the enshrined hierarchy of the field called Classics, which has too often valued imagined monoliths of Greece and Rome above the multicultural, multilingual, and polyvocal reality of a complex ancient world. And so, while this first issue offers salutation to our readers for the first time, it also bids farewell to the conventions and traditions that precede us.

Our choice of title was also inspired by the fact that so many of these pieces engage with notions of departing. D. M. Spitzer’s deft translation of archaic Greek fragments focuses on aspects of their authors' experiences that are not always taught: the exile, displacement, and migration that complicate the meaning of origin and home. In a new treatment of a poem by Sappho that retells a famous story of leaving home, Robert Carpenter muses on the theme further, by inviting the reader to wonder at the gaps usually filled in by modern editors. In a dreamlike glimpse into Statius' epic, Phillip Dupesovski paints a picture of the slippery god of Sleep, whose own journey between realms is translated in equal parts imagery and sound. 

Still other pieces dwell in the experiences of those left behind by another’s departure. With a modern urgency, Griffin Budde's translation of Propertius captures the poet’s bitter sorrow at watching a beloved set sail for new horizons. In powerful and poignant translation, Mary Hamil Gilbert accesses the nostalgic pain for a natural world that lingers in Anyte’s original epigrams dedicated to departed animals. Claire LeSar’s accompanying collages collapse layers of time and place into a single frame, asking us to consider whose experiences are recorded in history—and whose are not. 

This issue reaches back to touch on some of the earliest surviving storytelling traditions of the ancient Mediterranean. With a series of visual art pieces, Christopher Patton offers a reimagining of Dumuzi, a god of ancient Sumerian origin whose presence is felt in many later mythical and literary traditions. In a collaborative retranslation of the opening to the Iliad, a team of five translators offers new ways to read a work whose "original" form is itself full of divergences. Casey Dué illuminates the process in an accompanying essay, advocating for a method of translation that renders visible the elements of an oral epic that are traditionally hidden from the reader. 

Departures ends with a sustained pause upon a single author: Catullus, a treasured favorite among students and scholars of Latin. At the hands of three translators, the poet takes on a multiplicity of identities. A. J. Woodman translates in honor of a departed friend, a testament to how translation can impart tribute and to the lasting impact of translation as a memorial. Susan McLean has chosen from among the most bawdy and least translated of the poet’s work, disrupting expectations of decorum that we may bring to Latin poetry. Anna Jackson’s sonnets bestow a renewed emotional urgency and playfulness to Catullus’ most translated poems by offering a throwback to high school hallways and defying constraints of form.  

Unique to this journal is our “In the Classroom” section, where we consider how pieces in this issue can be used as pedagogical tools. Here, we hope to depart from the traditional mode of translation used in the classroom. Katherine Wasdin's “Teaching Catullus in Translation” essay invites instructors of Latin to consider how teaching literary translation can expand students’ learning of the Latin language, a poet like Catullus, and the reception of Latin literature. In her essay, she presents a lesson plan, where students have the chance to explore the different ways that a poem can mean with the fresh Catullan translations contained in this volume. She also includes suggested readings on translation to provide students with some background and terminology for their discussion. Additionally, the reading list she provides can aid instructors wishing to teach with any of the pieces in this volume. While this essay is specific to Catullus and the Latin language, its approach to an introductory lesson about literary translation can transcend the language classroom. The side-by-side translations and original language texts in this journal make the pieces accessible to any classroom.

In the spirit of access, Departures is also an invitation. We invite you to join us, not only as readers, but as contributors and educators with a role to play in the shape Ancient Exchanges will take as we look ahead to future issues. Thank you for traveling with us on this first part of our journey, and we hope to keep you reading. 

love,

the Ancient X editors 

Adrienne Rose 
Laura Moser  
Echo Smith 
Sara Hales-Brittain
Lindsay Vella