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I haven't read them in English, but I've browsed through them (when I bought them for someone else) and they seemed very well translated. If I remember correctly, Eco himself praised his translators in his book on translation (of which the English translation should be this one but for some reason it has only one third of the pages compared to the original.)

Eco's books are full of cultural references that don't necessarily have to be understood in order to enjoy the book, but which add depth and meaning if understood. Whenever a certain reference is too specific to Italian speakers, translators usually replace that reference with something the English-speaking public would understand. In the case of translations into major languages, this is done with the approval of the writer. There is often a series of conversations between Eco and his translators on how this or that passage of his books ought to be translated.

My favorite novels are Foucault's Pendulum and Baudolino. The latter starts funny, in a medieval-ish language that Eco invented for the purpose of this book. Some (including me) love it, others hate it, but if you skim through the first chapter and just focus on the rest you will still be able to understand and enjoy the story.

I did not like The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana, and I don't think I'll ever be able to finish it. I enjoyed the first few chapters, but then it turns into an endless list or catalog, with basically no plot and no hope of ever getting back to a plot, so I gave up.

As for the remaining two books, I only started them and then abandoned them. I've the feeling that I might like them a lot, provided that I read them when I'm in the right frame of mind. I love Eco but I need to be in the right mood. At some point I plan to get to them.

The versions I got, this publisher for all three, had a couple good things in it. One, the italian was on the left hand pages, the english on the right, so you could still see the poetry. Two, all of the three were about 300 pages of text, and then about a hundred pages of finer print notes. I didn't read all the notes, but I used a good bit of them. They definitely helped me understand a good part of the history I definitely was lost on.

Should you go back? Yes. That's my opinion. The translation I had, even if you didn't read the notes, was simply a beautiful sounding translation. The beginning of purgatory is the most boring part, which I didn't even think bad, but it definitely gets better and more interesting when he goes through the seven deadly sins. Paradise is simply awe inspiring. You need to get through Purgatory just to get to Paradise. Purgatory was the worst of the three if I had to rank.

The New Bloomsday Book is a fantastic guide. I'm not going to say, "Don't be afraid of ULYSSES" because it is daunting. but for all its intimidation, its very fun. Imagine the language that you loved about Portrait except way more playful, lyrical, and funny.

As far as I know, the book is still representative of the current state of scholarship concerning the period. It deals exclusively with the period between 1914 and 1922, which is, by this time, relatively declassified in terms of documentation, so I wouldn't expect another book to eclipse it any time soon, unless someone happens to write a better synthesis of the available material.

It looks like the publisher recently released a 20th anniversary edition with an afterword from the author. That wasn't the edition I read, but I would imagine Fromkin's afterword serves as an index of more recent developments in the study of that period.

As for follow-up reading, my plan is to go regional, with a string of books about the development of the nationalisms that got their start in that period. So, on the one hand, I want to start digging backwards into the Ottoman Empire prior to the Young Turk movement (which more or less starts APTEAP), and on the other, I'd like to examine the modern histories of Transjordan, early Jewish nationalism, Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan. Before I get to all of that, though, I've got A History of the Arab Peoples by Albert Hourani, which ought to keep me occupied for a while, once I start it.

Thanks, good response. I've read Homer and Virgil a couple of times, and Genesis once. Mythology has been on my reading list for a while.

I read How to Read and Why by Harold Bloom a few months ago, and he raves about Paradise Lost.

It took me 2 tries to get into. Though I have only read one tiny part of another version, I read the entire book of this version. It was a pretty easy read for me after getting used to his style, of course. Though it took me a few months because I was reading at a slow pace.

Another America: The Story of Liberia and the Former Slaves Who Ruled It

The Liberia Travel Guide 2016 - Kindle only

Mighty Be Our Powers: How Sisterhood, Prayer, and Sex Changed a Nation at War

You should also post this message at The Liberia Subreddit

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0692730133/ref=cm_sw_su_dp

I read this years ago. Is this the one where they are stuck on a relativistic spaceship that is ever approaching the speed of light?

Do they find some way to get off the ship? [You might want to use a spoiler cover if you answer that]

Another good book about relativistic space travel is A World Out of Time by Larry Niven. Guy steals a relativistic starship, goes on long galactic tour, returns home billions [?] of years in the future to find the Earth in orbit around Jupiter and nearly all the people gone.