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CHARLES BOER (1939–2014)
Charles Boer taught mythology, poetry, and individual 20th-century writers in the English department at University of Connecticut from 1966 to 1992. He was a gifted translator of ancient Greek and Latin. His translation from ancient Greek of the Homeric hymns was nominated for the National Book Award in 1972, and his translations from Latin of Marsilio Ficino’s Book of Life (1980) and Ovid’s Metamorphoses (1989) were highly praised. His most popular and successful book (translated into 28 different languages), however, was Freud’s Own Cookbook, written with James Hillman. His other books include works of poetry and biography along with numerous literary and critical articles and lectures, and poems mostly published in small publications. After retiring from UConn, Boer became the editor of Spring: A Journal of Archetype and Culture and taught mythology and classics at the Pacifica Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara (1994–97). In addition, he was a regular participant and lecturer at the Eranos Conferences (1972–2001) in Ascona, Switzerland and a founder of the international Myth & Theatre Conference in 1986, in which he participated until 1999.
 
Cover image with Homer

THE HOMERIC HYMNS
Translated by CHARLES BOER
Third, revised edition
Paperback original, 210 pages, $22
ISBN: 978-0-88214-167-1
Kindle/Apple Books, $9.99
978-0-88214-168-8

One of the most remarkable translations of an ancient Greek text ever made. Scrupulously faithful to every line of Homer’s text, its language nonetheless sings and moves, evoking the mythic imagination of ancient Greece in a manner rarely captured before. By avoiding the conventions of academic style which afflict so many classical translators, Charles Boer’s verse delivers for us the world of Homer’s gods and goddesses as a fresh and stunning experience. Since 1972, this version of the Homeric Hymns—nominated for a National Book Award—has been acclaimed by the critics and public alike and has widely established itself as a classroom text.
 
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We are all very much in Boer’s debt, and we should all welcome the appearance of a new translator who possesses both the power of language and respect for that past that can restore us the secrets of our own lost or threatened humanity.
    — William Arrowsmith
 
Cover image with Correggio painting of Io and Jupiter

OVID’S METAMORPHOSES
Translated by CHARLES BOER
Second, revised edition
Paperback original, 418 pages, $26
ISBN: 978-0-88214-169-5
Kindle/Apple Books, $9.99
978-0-88214-170-1

The greatest single narration of what the mythic world of antiquity looked, thought, and felt like at its climax in a striking translation. In this tour de force, all the classic tales of Western mythology come to life.
 
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This is the authentic Ovid, the feeling, the pulse, the mental and vocal style of a vanished people. Boer has found this hidden beat, and the eerie excitement in every line shows me what veils have lain between us and the ancients up till now  …This is what the ancients were sitting still for, nothing less, of that I’m certain.
    — William Kotzwinkle
 
Cover image with Michelangelo's Bacchus

MARSILIO FICINO’S BOOK OF LIFE
Translated by CHARLES BOER
Third, revised edition
Paperback original, 250 pages, $24
ISBN: 978-0-88214-171-8
Kindle/Apple Books, $9.99
978-0-88214-172-5

Charles Boer’s groundbreaking translation of Marsilio Ficino’s immensely popular Renaissance treatise on mental and physical health, Liber de vita. Ficino wrote about the secrets of food, the pleasures in life, the antidotes to depression, and a lot of other wisdoms that had been lost for centuries.
   A founding text of archetypal psychology, it has long been an important source for image-oriented thought.
Sigmund Freud wearing a cook hat
FREUD’S OWN COOKBOOK
Edited by JAMES HILLMAN and CHARLES BOER
With illustrations by JEFF FISHER
Second, revised edition
Paperback original, 206 pages, $22
ISBN: 978-0-88214-165-7
Kindle/Apple Books, $9.99
978-0-88214-166-4

Eat your way to sanity the Freudian way, with recipes from Sigmund Freud's long-suppressed private cookbook. Here is the definitive work Freud would have given us had he not been distracted by his patients, anxieties, and professional articles. As the master himself writes, “Enough has been recorded of what we said; yet not one word of what we ate.” These are the authentic dishes that not only delighted those pioneers of the pleasure principle but nourished them as well.
    With these recipes come Freud’s intimate revelations about his colleagues and patients, their gastronomical peculiarities—and some of his own—and previously unpublished reflections on his theories, including “Civilization and Its Indigestion,” “The Interpretation of Creams,” “Moses and Matzoballism,” and “Luncheon Interruptus.” The truth comes out about Jung’s fainting spells and Freud’s lifelong dislike of chicken.
   Replete with source notes, editors’ comments, index, tips on technique, and delightful illustrations of the Vienna circle at the table, Freud’s Own Cookbook is essential for those who only know oral eroticism as a theory. Now everyone can try it, as Freud did, in the privacy of the kitchen.
 
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I didn't know he could cook. In fact, I didn't know men could cook.
   — Alma Mahler
A lovely book, a work of genius. I’m sending him some peaches.
    — Nellie Melba