Autograph letter signed : Olney, to Walter Bagot, 1786 Jan. 15.

Record ID: 
364864
Accession number: 
MA 86.5
Author: 
Cowper, William, 1731-1800.
Credit: 
Purchased by Pierpont Morgan, 1904.
Description: 
1 item (3 p.) ; 20.1 cm
Notes: 

Docketed.
Part of a large collection of letters from and related to William Cowper; please see collection record for MA 86-87 for more information.

Summary: 

Explaining why the publication of his Proposals has been delayed; discussing his translation of Homer's Iliad; commenting on his plan for publishing his translation of the Iliad by subscription; noting that his version of the Iliad will cost less than [Alexander] Pope's version; addressing the question of whether he expects his translation to be better than Pope's: "You may say perhaps ... do you place yourself on a level with Pope? I answer, or rather should answer -- By no means. Not as a poet. But as a Translator of Homer if I did not expect and believe that I should even surpass him, why have I meddled with this matter at all? If I confess inferiority, I reprobate my own undertaking."

Provenance: 
Sale (Sotheby's, 28-29 July 1903, lot 460); purchased by Pierpont Morgan from the London dealer J. Pearson & Co., 1904.