I don't like the way you handwaved my criticism. Complete red herring? I brought up only the first line because it's the most famous part of the poem and it sets the tone for the rest of the book, which – as you pointed out – is more of an adaptation. It might be acceptable for some people, fact remains that the new sentence hardly resembles the original meaning. If meaning can't be our benchmark, then how do we determine the quality of a translation?
I am not hand waving it. This line was commented ad nauseam when the book was released and is the one people who have no idea of neither what in the Greek text nor what’s in the translation like to discuss. As it’s far from being the most questionable part of the translation, I don’t see the point of centring discussion on it, especially when you consider it’s not an awful translation of the original. It’s not very close but you can find far worse later.
