Martin Litchfield West,OM, FBA (23 September 1937 – 13 July 2015) was a Britishphilologist andclassical scholar.[1] In recognition of his contribution to scholarship, he was appointed to theOrder of Merit in 2014.[2]
West also produced an edition ofHomer'sIliad for theBibliotheca Teubneriana, accompanied by a study of its critical tradition and overall philology entitledStudies in the Text and Transmission of the Iliad. A further volume onThe Making of the Iliad appeared ten years later, and one onThe Making of the Odyssey was published in 2014.
Martin Litchfield West was born on 23 September 1937 at Eltham General Hospital (Eltham,London), the elder child (there being a younger daughter, Dr Jennifer Bywaters) of civil engineer Maurice Charles West and Catherine Baker,née Stainthorpe. His parents lived at that time inOrpington, but moved in 1939 toHampton, where his father was appointed resident engineer at theMetropolitan Water Board-operatedwaterworks.[3] West's father's family were from theHome Counties, and his mother's family fromYorkshire andDurham. His paternal grandfather, Robert West, lectured in electrical engineering; his maternal grandfather, John Stainthorpe, was a railwayman fromPickering. Litchfield was themaiden name of his paternal grandmother.[3][4]
Aged four, West entered the private preparatory school ofDenmead. At 11, he lost a scholarship at Colet Court (nowSt Paul's Juniors), but was offered a feepaying place instead. West discovered at Colet his interest in languages and invented at 14 a competitor ofEsperanto he labelled 'Unilingua'.[5] In 1951, he won a scholarship to the main school,St Paul's. Excelling at both linguistics and mathematics, he was advanced to the 'Upper Eighth' and sat for a scholarship toBalliol College a year early. His tutors includedDonald Russell,Michael Stokes andRussell Meiggs. Among his peers were futureNobel Prize winnerAnthony J. Leggett, and futurePermanent SecretaryPeter Gregson.[6]
From the mid-sixties, West took especial interest in the relation of Greek literature to the Orient, and over several decades, culminating in his masterpieceThe East Face of Helicon (1997), defended his view that Greek literature derives significant influences and inspiration from Near Eastern literature. He took up a position as tutorial fellow at University College, a position he filled from 1963 to 1974. In 1973 he became the second youngest person to be elected a Fellow of theBritish Academy, at the age of 35. He obtained a chair atRoyal Holloway and Bedford New College, which he held from 1974 until 1991, when he became a fellow ofAll Souls College.[10][11] West retired formally in 2004, but remained active in All Souls until the end of his life.[12]
West died of a heart attack in 2015 in Oxford at the age of 77.[2][13] Fellow Oxford academicArmand D'Angour paid tribute to him as "a man of few words in seven languages".[14]
Early Greek Philosophy and the Orient, Oxford:Clarendon Press 1971, xv + 256 pp.; translation into Italian, Bologna 1993
Textual Criticism and Editorial Technique Applicable to Greek and Latin Texts (Teubner Studienbücher), Stuttgart:B.G. Teubner 1973, 155 pp.; translation into Greek, Athens 1989; translation into Italian, Palermo 1991; translation into Hungarian, Budapest 1999
Studies in Greek Elegy and Iambus (Untersuchungen zur antiken Literatur und Geschichte 14), Berlin, New York:Walter de Gruyter 1974, ix + 198 pp.ISBN978-3-110-04585-7.
Immortal Helen: an inaugural lecture delivered on 30 April 1975, London: Bedford College 1975, 18 pp.ISBN0-900145-30-7
Hesiod,Theogony, ed. withprolegomena and commentary by M. L. West, Oxford: Clarendon Press 1966, xiii + 459 pp.ISBN0-19-814169-6.
Fragmenta Hesiodea, ed.: R. Merkelbach et M. L. West, Oxford: Clarendon Press 1967, 236 pp.
Iambi et elegi Graeci ante Alexandrum cantati. 1 :Archilochus.Hipponax.Theognidea, ed. M. L. West, Oxford: Clarendon Press 1971, revised edition 1989, xvi + 256
Iambi et elegi Graeci ante Alexandrum cantati. 2 :Callinus.Mimnermus.Semonides.Solon.Tyrtaeus. Minora adespota, ed. M. L. West, Oxford: Clarendon Press 1972, revised edition 1992 x + 246 pp.
Sing me, goddess. Being the first recitation of Homer's Iliad, translated by Martin West, London:Duckworth 1971, 43 pp.ISBN0-7156-0595-X
Theognidis etPhocylidis fragmenta et adespota quaedam gnomica, ed. M. L. West (Kleine Texte für Vorlesungen und Übungen 192), Berlin: Walter de Gruyter 1978, iv + 49 pp.
Hesiod,Works and Days, ed. with prolegomena and commentary by M.L. West, Oxford: Clarendon Press 1978, xiii + 399 pp.
Delectus ex Iambis et Elegis Graecis, ed. M. L. West, Oxford: Clarendon Press 1980, ix + 295 pp.ISBN0-19-814589-6
Euripides,Orestes, ed. with transl. and commentary by M. L. West, Warminster: Aris & Phillips 1987, ix + 297 pp.ISBN0-85668-310-8
Hesiod,Theogony, and Works and Days, transl. and with an introduction by M. L. West, Oxford: Oxford University Press 1988, xxv + 79 pp.ISBN0-19-281788-4
Greek Lyric Poetry. The poems and fragments of the Greek iambic, elegiac, and melic poets (excludingPindar andBacchylides) down to 450 B.C., [verse translation] Oxford: Oxford university Press 1993, xxv + 213 pp.ISBN0-19-282360-4
Greek Epic Fragments from the Seventh to the Fifth Centuries BC, edited and translated by Martin L. West (TheLoeb Classical Library 497). London Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press 2003ISBN0-674-99605-4
His works also include contributions to dictionaries and books and more than 200 articles and papers since 1960.
West, M. L. (1960). "Anaxagoras and the Meteorite of 467 B.C.".Journal of the British Astronomical Association.70 (8):45–46.
West, M. L. (1961). "An Ancient Reference to the Quadrantids".Journal of the British Astronomical Association.71 (5): 104.
West, M. L. (1961). "Alleged Apparitions of Halley's Comet in the Eighteenth Century B.C. and Earlier".Journal of the British Astronomical Association.71 (7):324–326.
West, M. L. (1969). "Near Eastern Material in Hellenistic and Roman Literature".Harvard Studies in Classical Philology.73:113–134.doi:10.2307/311152.ISSN0073-0688.JSTOR311152.
