Toward a New Interlinear Gloss of De Rerum Natura

Here's something slightly horrible that I didn't know existed. In the late 19th century a series of interlinear texts were published with the Latin "reduced to the natural English order", meaning that they rearranged the words of the Latin (usually subject->object->verb) to match the word order of English sentences, which is typically Subject->Verb->object.

Horace Complete Interlinear : Horace : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Horace Complete Interlinear

archive.org

I shall have to track down more information. What strikes me immediately is that this process would utterly ruin poetry and the "Latinity" of good prose; I wonder if contemporary reviewers had the same misgivings.

Prepare to be underwhelmed! I have finished a draft of lines.....

...

1-5.

I stand now at a crossroads. The biggest obstacle right now is trying to verify the grammar notes, which sources disagree on, and which I am ill-equipped to offer any opinion on. One of the books I am consulting is Leonard and Smith's Lucretius from 1943, which is an extensive commentary on the Latin text of Lucretius. It lacks only two things; an interlinear translation, and grammar notation. My options at the moment are to:

• Keep things as they are. I do find this work rewarding, but progress is very slow.
• Double down on the Interlinear side and leave out grammar notes and all but the most basic commentary. This would be easy and I could work more quickly, but the process is fairly dull and mindless.
• A third option would be to find an existing public domain English language commentary, and import that wholesale into my interlinear text.

Regardless of anything I do, this monumental commentary by Stanley Barney Smith on Leonard's Latin text of Lucretius is excellent and very interesting. He downplays interest in the grammar in order to focus on linking passages in Lucretius to other sources in Classical literature for comparative purposes.

De Rerum Natura: The Latin Text of Lucretius (Latin and English Edition)

De Rerum Natura: The Latin Text of Lucretius (Latin and English Edition)

www.amazon.com

(The Amazon sample shown in "Look Inside" is of a different book entirely)

An increasingly appealing option to me at the moment is to use Leonard's Latin text from Perseus instead of Bailey's, and proceed with the view that my interlinear text will serve as a Creative Commons companion to the Perseus Project as well as Smith's commentary. I could work quite rapidly under those terms and still produce something very useful.

That is excellent, Bryan, thank you! I really like how you use color and font to denote the most important parts of speech!