Book Nine (A FRAGMENT) "NOR could the Trojan fighters break through the walls of their foemen, Nor could the mighty Pelides slay in his war-rage the Trojans. Ever he fought surrounded or drew back compelled to his legions; For to each spear of his strength full twenty hissed round his helmet, Cried1 on his shield, attempted his cuirass or leaped at his coursers Or at Automedon ran like living things in their blood-thirst. Galled the deathless steeds high-neighing pawed in their anger; Wrathful Achilles wheeled and threatened seeking a victim. So might a fire on the high-piled altar of sacrifice blazing Seek for its tong

  AN ANSWER TO A CRITICISM* Milford accepts the rule that two consonants after a short vowel make the short vowel long, even if they are outside the word and come in another word following it. To my mind that is an absurdity. I shall go on pronouncing the y of frosty as short whether it has two consonants after it or only one or none; it remains frosty whether it is a frosty scalp or forsly top or a frosty anything. In no case have I pronounced it or could I consent to pronounce it as frostee. My hexameters are intended to be read naturally as one would read any English sentence. But if you admit a short syllable to be long whenever there are two consonants after it,

Book Seven THE BOOK OF THE WOMAN SO to the voice of their best they were bowed and obeyed un debating; Men whose hearts were burning yet with implacable passion Felt Odysseus' strength and rose up clay to his counsels. King Agamemnon rose at his word, the wide-ruling monarch, Rose at his word the Cretan and Locrian, Thebes and Epirus, Nestor rose, the time-tired hoary chief of the Pylians. Round Agamemnon the Atreid Europe surged in her chieftains Forth from their tent on the shores of the Troad, splendid in armour, Into the golden blaze of the sun and the race of the sea-winds. Fierce and clear like a fl

Book Eight THE BOOK OF THE GODS SO on the earth the seed that was sown of the centuries ripened; Europe and Asia, met on their borders, clashed in the Troad. All over earth men wept and bled and laboured, world-wide Sowing Fate with their deeds and had other fruit than they hoped for, Out of desires and their passionate griefs and fleeting enjoyments Weaving a tapestry fit for the gods to admire, who in silence Joy, by the cloud and the sunbeam veiled, and men know not their movers. They in the glens of Olympus, they by the waters of Ida Or in their temples worshipped in vain or with heart-strings of mortals

    ILION AN EPIC IN QUANTITATIVE HEXAMETERS         ILION   AN EPIC IN QUANTITATIVE HEXAMETERS   SRI AUROBINDO         SRI AUROBINDO ASHRAM PONDICHERRY 1957  

Book Five THE BOOK OF ACHILLES MEANWHILE grey from the Trojan gates Talthybius journeyed, Spurred by the secret thought of the Fates who change not nor falter Simois sighed round his wheels and Xanthus roared at his passing, Troas' god like a lion wroth and afraid; to meet him Whistling the ocean breezes came and Ida regarded. So with his haste in his wheels the herald ocean ward driving Came through the gold of the morn o'er the trampled green of the pastures Back to the ships and the roar of the sea and the iron hopped leaguer. Wide to the left his circle he wrote where the tents of Achilles Trooped lik

Book Three THE BOOK OF THE ASSEMBLY BUT as the nation beset betwixt doom and a shameful surrender Waited mute for a voice that could lead and a heart to encourage, Up in the silence deep Laocoön rose up, far-heard,— Heard by the gods in their calm and heard by men in their passion— Cloud-haired, clad in mystic red, flamboyant, sombre, Priam's son Laocoön, fate-darkened seer of Apollo. As when the soul of the Ocean arises rapt in the dawning And mid the rocks and the foam uplifting the voice of its musings Opens the chant of its turbulent harmonies, so rose the far-borne Voice of Laocoön soaring mid

  Book One THE BOOK OF THE HERALD DAWN in her journey eternal compelling the labour of mortals, Dawn the beginner of things with the night for their rest or their ending, Pallid and bright-lipped a r rived from the mists and the chill of the Euxine. Earth in the dawn-fire delivered from starry and shadowy vastness Woke to the wonder of life and its passion and sorrow and beauty, All on her bosom sustaining, the patient compassionate Mother. Out of the formless vision of Night with its look on things hidden Given to the gaze of the azure she lay in her garment of greenness, Wearing light on her brow. In the dawn-ray

Book Six THE BOOK OF THE CHIEFTAINS BUT from their midst up rearing a brow that no crown could ennoble, Male and kingly of front like a lion conscious of puissance Rose a form august, the monarch great Agamemnon. Wroth he rose yet throwing a rein on the voice of his passion, Governing the beast and the demon within by the god who is mighty. "Happily for thy life and my fame that thou comst with the aegis of heaven Shadowing thy hoary brows, thou herald of pride and of insult. Well is it too for his days who sent thee that other and nobler Heaven made my heart than his who insults and a voice of the immortal

  APPENDICES ON QUANTITATIVE METRE THE REASON OF PAST FAILURES   A definitive verdict seems to have been pronounced by the critical mind on the long-continued attempt to introduce quantitative metres into English poetry. It is evident that the attempt has failed, and it can even be affirmed that it was predestined to failure; quantitative metre is something alien to the rhythm of the language. Pure quantity, dependent primarily on the length or brevity of the vowel of the syllable, but parity also on the consonants on which the vowel sustains itself, quantity as it was understood in the ancient classical languages, is in the English tongue small in its incidence,