Homér: Quotes about men

“Men grow tired of sleep, love, singing and dancing, sooner than of war.”

Homér Iliad

A misquotation http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2009-August/092648.html of:

Πάντων μὲν κόρος ἐστὶ καὶ ὕπνου καὶ φιλότητος
μολπῆς τε γλυκερῆς καὶ ἀμύμονος ὀρχηθμοῖο,
τῶν πέρ τις καὶ μᾶλλον ἐέλδεται ἐξ ἔρον εἷναι
ἢ πολέμου· Τρῶες δὲ μάχης ἀκόρητοι ἔασιν.

Men get
Their fill of all things, of sleep and love, sweet song
And flawless dancing, and most men like these things
Much better than war. Only Trojans are always
Thirsty for blood!

Iliad, XIII, 636–639 (tr. Ennis Rees)

The misquotation implies that an overweening love of war was the norm, whereas the real quote decries the Trojans as inhumane for keeping the war going.
Misattributed

Singing , Sleep , War , Dance

“We men are wretched things.”

Homér Iliad

Source: The Iliad

Men

“Men are so quick to blame the gods: they say
that we devise their misery. But they
themselves- in their depravity- design
grief greater than the griefs that fate assigns.”

Homér The Odyssey (Cowper)

Source: The Odyssey

Men , God , Fate

“But Zeus does not bring to accomplishment all thoughts in men's minds.”

Homér Iliad

XVIII. 328 (tr. R. Lattimore).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

Men

“Who on earth could blame them? Ah, no wonder
the men of Troy and Argives under arms have suffered
years of agony all for her, for such a woman.
Beauty, terrible beauty!
A deathless goddess—so she strikes our eyes!”

Homér Iliad

III. 156–158 (tr. Robert Fagles); of Helen.
Richmond Lattimore's translation:
: Surely there is no blame on Trojans and strong-greaved Achaians
if for long time they suffer hardship for a woman like this one.
Terrible is the likeness of her face to immortal goddesses.
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

Men , Beauty , Suffering

“And gods in guise of strangers from afar in every form do roam our cities, marking the sin and righteousness of men.”

Homér The Odyssey (Cowper)

XVII. 485–487 (tr. G. H. Palmer).
Odyssey (c. 725 BC)

Men , God

“So now I meet my doom. Well let me die—
but not without struggle, not without glory, no,
in some great clash of arms that even men to come
will hear of down the years!”

Homér Iliad

XXII. 303 (tr. Robert Fagles); spoken by Hector.
Richmond Lattimore's translation:
: But now my death is upon me.
Let me at least not die without a struggle, inglorious,
but do some big thing first, that men to come shall know of it.
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

Men

“Always it is, that the hearts in the younger men are frivolous,
but when an elder man is among them, he looks behind him
and in front, so that all comes out far better for both sides.”

Homér Iliad

III. 108–110 (tr. Richmond Lattimore).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

Men , Heart

“If only strife could die from the lives of gods and men”

Homér Iliad

XVIII. 107–110 (tr. Robert Fagles); spoken by Achilles.
Iliad (c. 750 BC)
Context: If only strife could die from the lives of gods and men
and anger that drives the sanest man to flare in outrage—
bitter gall, sweeter than dripping streams of honey,
that swarms in people's chests and blinds like smoke.

Men , God

“Let me not then die ingloriously and without a struggle, but let me first do some great thing that shall be told among men hereafter.”

Homér Iliad

Source: The Iliad

Men

“Ruin, eldest daughter of Zeus, she blinds us all, that fatal madness—she with those delicate feet of hers, never touching the earth, gliding over the heads of men to trap us all. She entangles one man, now another.”

Homér Iliad

Source: The Iliad

Men , Daughters , Madness

“As is the generation of leaves, so is that of humanity.
The wind scatters the leaves on the ground, but the live timber
Burgeons with leaves again in the season of spring returning.
So one generation of men will grow while another dies.”

Homér Iliad

VI. 146–149 (tr. R. Lattimore); Glaucus to Diomed.
Alexander Pope's translation:
: Like leaves on trees the race of man is found,
Now green in youth, now withering on the ground:
Another race the following spring supplies,
They fall successive, and successive rise:
So generations in their course decay;
So flourish these, when those are past away.
Iliad (c. 750 BC)
Source: The Iliad

Men , Spring , Season

“I have no interest at all in food and drink, but only in slaughter and blood and the agonized groans of mangled men”

Homér

Men , Food , Drink

“Think not to match yourself against gods, for men that walk the earth cannot hold their own with the immortals.”

Homér Iliad

V. 440–442 (tr. Samuel Butler).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

Men , God , Thinking

“Let us put our griefs to rest in our own hearts…
What good's to be won from tears that chill the spirit?
So the immortals spun our lives that we, we wretched men
live on to bear such torments—the gods live free of sorrows.”

Homér Iliad

XXIV. 522–526 (tr. Robert Fagles).
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

Men , God , Tear , Heart