YOUR ABUELITA'S BOOK(S), INCLUDING THE ILIAD

Dear Son,

Of course you know this book--a book your Abuelita wrote for her family, including you:

     DAWAC and Other Memoir-Narratives by Beatriz Tilan Tabios

I know you will always treasure this book as it includes your grandma's stories of her life as a little girl in World War II.  She did always repeat those same stories over and over, didn't she?  But it's a great story!  Reading Homer's Iliad because there's nothing else to do when, having fled to the mountains, she and the family had to wait out the Japanese invaders of her village in the Philippines...and that while still a young girl she nevertheless chose the Iliad because it was a small book she could carry along with rice and salt in her ready-made evacuation bag... You can now read about it forever in her book.

And, when I begin to repeat myself and my stories, I hope you remember Abuelita and feel compassion for how memory, as it ages, must continually recycle itself in an ultimately failed attempt to preserve itself.

Oh, I can feel you thinking that at the time of this writing, I've already begun to repeat myself...?  Really, Son, I do not know what you are talking about ... and did I ever tell you about ...

Love,

Mom

P.S.  Naturally, you also should read the Iliad someday.  Fortunately, we have five copies in the library for you!  The first copy is actually your father's first copy of the Iliad; he was 16 when he owned this version "Retold" by Barbara Leonie Picard and illustrated by Joan Kiddell-Monroe. It was published by Henry Z. Walck, Inc. (New York)/Oxford in 1960.  Dad got his copy from his high school Buckingham Browne & Nichols (Massachusetts) -- note the penciled scrawl of his name on the first page.

The second copy is translated by Ennis Rees and published by Oxford in 1991.  This would be a good reading copy:

The third copy is "in contemporary verse" by Robert Fitzgerald with illustrations by W.T. Mars.  It's a lovely production of a leather spine albeit a cloth cover, put out by The Franklin Library as chosen by Oxford.  It's not as deluxe as The Easton Press but still pleasing to the eye:

Next, the fourth copy is part of the Loeb Classical Library and is translated by A.T. Murray, as revised by William F. Wyatt:

Lastly, the fifth copy is the most luxe edition we have, part of the Collector's Edition of "The 100 Greatest Books Ever Written" that came out of The Easton Press in 1979.  It presents the English verse translation by Alexander Pope and illustrations with "the classical designs" of John Flaxman.  The cover is leather-bound with gold leaf, while the pages are archival quality paper specially milled for the edition.  (Dad got this single copy inexpensively from Ebay for $30.) Here are images:

Son, while we have five copies for you -- all a far cry from the book your Abuelita once tucked into her pack for mountain travel -- may you also find your way someday to that point where you would acquire your own copies.  Your own acquisition would imply you came to value this book -- something that would cause pride in you to arise within not just me and Dad proud but also your Abuelita....