I have taught Sophocles in translation and in Greek to American and Australian university undergraduates for over 25 years. When choosing a translation for them to study, Iadmit that Ido exactly what Taplin assumes reviewers of translations do: Ijudge subjectively. Taplin writes: ‘It is a standard negative criticism levelled at translations that they include turns of phrase that are either too low in diction, or too high, according to the taste of the reviewer’ (xxix). Imyself steer away from translations that seem too ‘adapted’ or too ‘free’ as to make the ‘ancient Greekness’ of the play unrecognizable, but also avoid prose since Iagree with Taplin that ‘Poetry calls for poetry, or, at the very least, for crafted verse’ (xxvii). When Taplin’s translations of Sophocles’ ‘female’ tragedies (Antigone, Trachiniae (which he titles Deianeira) and Electra) were published in 2020 during COVID, and students (including graduate researchers) wanted my advice for a ‘good’ translation of Sophocles, Irecommended Taplin without hesitation. Even from the quickest skim it was evident that he was offering what Ineeded: a new verse translation with poetic English word choice that was consistently close to the original Greek sentiment, and copious endnotes for those ignorant of the mythological background, ancient social customs, textual criticism, performance practice and even the geography of Greece.

It is an old adage that translation is the first step towards interpretation. In my view, Taplin illustrates to the English speaker how Sophocles earned his reputation in antiquity as the master of creating ēthos (‘character’). At Electra line 587, Electra rebukes her mother Clytemnestra for sleeping with Aegisthus, the man who helped kill her husband. In Greek, Aegisthus is described as τῷ παλαμναίῳ, which the LSJ defines as ‘one defiled by blood-guiltiness’, and Diggle’s Cambridge Greek Lexicon (Cambridge 2021) as a ‘man with blood on his hands’. Taplin translates it as ‘that poison filth’ (157), which might sound jarring, but in fact fits the emotion of the scene and communicates the vitriol that is fundamental to Electra’s anger. For Antigone lines 500–01 (‘I have no liking for a single syllable you say, and trust Inever shall’), Taplin replaces the awkward Greek syntax of an impersonal statement followed by a volitive optative with a simpler and even alliterative English phrasing that captures Antigone’s exasperation with her uncle Creon. The Ode to Man in Antigone famously begins πολλὰ τὰ δεινὰ (332). While many translators render δεινά as ‘wonderful’, Taplin (like Scott Horton’s 2007 translation in Harper’s Magazine) uses ‘formidable’, expressing the Chorus’ astonishment at human achievement. The semantics of δεινά, which range ‘from the terrifying to the marvellous’ (199), are difficult to capture in a single English word, and Inote that in his translation of the play, Paul Woodruff chose to paraphrase it as ‘Many wonders, many terrors’ (Sophocles: Antigone (Indianapolis 2001), 14).

The format of Taplin’s book replicates that of his 2015 translation of Sophocles’ four ‘male’ tragedies, Sophocles: Four Tragedies (Oxford 2015). The introductory chapters on ‘Sophocles and His Theatre’ (xi–xxvi), on Taplin’s translation itself (xxvii–xxxi), and on the ‘Text and Conventions’ (xxxiii–xxxvi) are shortened and tailored versions of the 2015 introductions. The overall presentation is a familiar one from OUP’s ‘Oxford World’s Classics’ series. Each play begins with a learned introduction, and circle symbols in the translation point to endnotes. Taplin’s use of square brackets around lines that could be deleted, angle brackets for his own insertions and italicization of Greek words (such as aulos, 85), makes this a scholar-friendly translation, albeit possibly daunting for the casual reader. Any theatre group wanting to perform this would need to decide carefully what lines to keep, what lines to cut, what words to find equivalences for. Yet Taplin’s translation quite rightly raises these textual critical challenges for the performer, as part and parcel of how Greek tragedy survives to us. We must begin with what the text is, or is not, or might be, and there is no escaping that. For example, what of Antigone lines 905–12, often doubted as not genuine, where Antigone claims she would never have disobeyed the law for a husband or child, but only for a brother? Taplin cleverly has it both ways: he translates the passage (47–48) but puts it in square brackets and signals an endnote (203) where he explains his belief that it is an actor’s interpolation. Another troublesome section, the ending of Trachiniae/Deianeira (lines 1275–79), attributed to Hyllus in most of the manuscripts, is assigned by Taplin to the Chorus without square brackets (125); an endnote explains the controversy.

In sum, Taplin’s translation communicates the mood and register of each passage with a confidence that only comes from decades of philological expertise. His work is the fruit of a lifetime of living with these plays in their original language and interpreting them for students and colleagues alike.