The far distant shore 3


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page 4  The verse "On a far distant shore" may have been taken from the Homer's Odyssey, although just one among dozens of versions is translated in that way. From the close-in-time but more popular "King James" version, Joyce's source for The Odyssey, it's similar: "from afar, from a distant land". About the other versions, compare the differences with a translation which became the "standard" in 1961: The phrase "from a far distant shore" has been used at least four other times: in the song "The Wild Rover" popular since the early 19th century, in a 1855 translation of Shubert's The Wanderer, in a 1865 poem named "Spring", and, curiously enough, in the same 1869 book of poems where Bigney wrote "Judah's land" and "opal's glow". All these "uses" are anyway second to the ancient Odyssey.

Immersion in an Homeric verse

The Odyssey was set in Greece. Rick Wright was in Greece in the summer of 1964, before knowing Syd in September, and in December Syd wrote to his girlfriend Jenny Spires that he wanted to be in Greece. Eventually Rick and Jenny went in Greece in 1966, but Syd never went there. Islands miles distant from Spain like Ibiza and neighbouring Formentera have shores Homerically suggestive as well, and Syd spent his holidays two times there, in 1967 and in 1969.

I have been doing lots of things – things interesting for me. I've done a lot of traipsing around. I've been back to Ibiza, Spain. I first went there with Rick, 3 years ago. It's an interesting place to be. I've written quite a lot too. I've been writing in all sorts of funny places. &mdash; Syd Barrett