No More Learning

[In De Vulgari Eloquio II, 13, Dante calls for freedom in the' rhyme order within the strophe, and cites this canzo of Amaut's as an example of poem where there is no rhyme within the single strophe. Dante's "Rithi- morum quoque relationi vacemus" implies no careless- ness concerning the blending of rhyme sounds, for we find him at the end of the chapter "et tertio rithimorum asperitas, nisi forte sit lenitati permista: nam lenium asperorumque rithimorum mixtura ipsa tragoedia nite- scit," as he had before demanded a mixture of shaggy and harsh words with the softer words of a poem. "Nimo scilicet eiusdem rithimi repercussio, nisi forte novum aliquid atque intentatum artis hoc sibi praeroget. " The De Eloquio is ever excellent testimony of the way in which, a great artist approaches the detail of metier. ]
? VIII TRANSLATORS OF GREEK EARLY TRANSLATORS OF HOMER L HUGHES SALEL
The dilection of Greek poets has waned during the last pestilent century, and this decline has, I think, kept pace with a decline in the use of Latin cribs to Greek authors. The classics have more and more become a baton exclusively for the cudgelling of schoolboys, and
less and less a diversion for the mature.
I do not imagine I am the sole creature who has been
well taught his Latin and very ill-taught his Greek (be- ginning at the age, say, of twelve, when one is unready to discriminate matters of style, and when the economy oftheadjectivecannotbewhollyabsorbing). Achild may be bulldozed into learning almost anything, but man accustomed to some degree of freedom is loath to ap- proach a masterpiece through five hundred pages of grammar. Even a scholar like Porson may confer with former translators.
We have drifted out of touch with the Latin authors as well, and we have mislaid the fine English versions: Golding's Metamorphoses; Gavin Douglas' Mneids; Marlowe's Eclogues from Ovid, in each of which books a great poet has compensated, by his own skill, any loss
321
? 322 INSTIGATIONS
intransition; anewbeautyhasineachcasebeencreated. Greek in English remains almost wholly unsuccessful, or rather, there are glorious passages but no lohg or whole satisfaction. Chapman remains the best English "Homer," marred though he may be by excess of added ornament, and rather more marred by parentheses and inversions, to the point of being hard to read in many places.
And if one turn to Chapman for almost any favorite passage one is almost sure to be disappointed; on the other hand I think no one will excel him in the plainer passages of narrative, as of Priam's going to Achilles in the XXIVth Iliad. Yet he breaks down in Priam's prayer at just the point where the language should be the simplest and austerest.
Pope is easier reading, and, out of fashion though he is, he has at least the merit of translating Homer into something. ThenadirofHomerictranslationisreached by the Leaf-Lang prose; Victorian faddism having per- suaded these gentlemen to a belief in King James fustian; their alleged prose has neither the concision of verse nor the virtues of direct motion. In their preface they grumble about Chapman's "mannerisms," yet their version is full of "Now behold I" and "yea even as" and "even as when," tushery possible only to an affected age bent on propaganda. For, having, despite the exclusion of the Diciionnaire Philosophique from the island, finally found that the Bible couldn't be retained either as his- tory or as private Renter from J'hvh's Hebrew Press bureau, the Victorians tried to boom it, and even its wilfully bowdlerized translations, as literature.
"So spake he, and roused Athene that already was set
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? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK 323
thereon. . . . Evenasthesonof. . . eveninsuch guise. . . . "
perhaps no worse than
"With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving"* but bad enough anyway.
Of Homer two qualities remain untranslated: the magnificent onomatopoeia, as of the rush of the waves on the sea-beach and their recession in:
xapd diva iroXii<^Xoi(rj3oto SaXAcin/s
untranslated and untranslatable; and, secondly, the au- thentic cadence of speech; the absolute conviction that the words used, let us say by Achilles to the "dog-faced" chicken-hearted Agamemnon, are in the actual swing of words spoken. This quality of actual speaking is not untranslatable. NotehowPopefailstotranslateit
There sat the seniors of the Trojan race
(Old Priam's chiefs, and most in Priam's grace)
The king, the first; Thymcetes at his side; Lampus and Clytius, long in counsel try'd Panthus and Hicetaon, once the strong; And next, the wisest of the reverend throng, Antenor grave, and sage Ucalegon,
Lean'd on the walls, and bask'd before the sun. Chiefs, who no more in bloody fights engage. But wise through time, and narrative with age, In summer days like grasshoppers rejoice,
A bloodless race, that send a feeble voice.
These, when the Spartan queen approach'd the tower. In secret own'd resistless beauty's power:
* Milton, of course, whom my detractors say I condemn with- out due circumspection.
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324
INSTIGATIONS
They cried, No wonder, such celestial charms For nine long years have set the world in arms What winning graces ! What majestic mien She moves a goddess, and she looks a queen Yet hence, oh Heaven, convey that fatal face, And from destruction save the Trojan race.
This is anything but the "surge and thunder," but it is, on the other hand, a definite idiom, within the limits of the rhymed pentameter couplet it is even musical in parts; there is imbecility in the antithesis, and bathos in "she looks a queen," but there is fine accomplishment in
"Wise through time, and narrative with age,"
Mr. Pope's own invention, and excellent. What we definitely can not hear is the voice of the old men speak- ing. Thesimileofthegrasshoppersiswellrendered,but the old voices do not ring in the ear.
Homer (iii. 156-160) reports their conversation:
Oil ;'^/iEO'(s, TpSias Kal kvKvriniSas Axatois
Toi^S &,n<j>l yvuaiKi iroKiiv xp^vov a\yea ir&. a-x(iv' Alias AflavaTjjffi de^s eis 3>ira ioiKev.
'AXXi Kal &s, rolrj xep ecus', kv vrjucrt vekaBco' MrjS' iliJilv TeKeeaai t' 'oirLffffu itrma Xittoito.
Which is given in Sam. Clark's ad verhum translation: "Non est indigne ferendum, Trojanos et bene-ocreatos
Archives
Tali de muliere longum tempus dolores pati
Omnino immortalibus deabus ad vultum similis est. Sed et sic, talis quamvis sit, in navibus redeat,
Neque nobis liberisque in posterum detrimentum
relinquatur. "
!
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? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK 325
Mr. Pope has given six short lines for five long ones, but he has added "fatal" to face (or perhaps only. lifted it from vineaii), he has added "winning graces," "ma- jestic," "looks a queen. " As for owning beauty's resist- less power secretly or in the open, the Greek is
Toioi &pa Tpi)Ci)v ij7i^Topes ijvr' kvl vhpyt^.
Ot 8' &)$ oiv elSov 'Ekkviiv tirl irhpyov lovaav, 'Hxa wpos AXXijXous h/ea icripbevr' aySpevov'
and Sam. Clark as follows:
"Tales utique Trojanorum proceres sedebant in turri. Hi autem ut viderunt Helenam ad turrim venientem,
;"
*Hko is an adjective of sound, it is purely objective, even submisse* is an addition; though "Rxa might, by a slight strain, be taken to mean that the speech of the old men came little by little, a phrase from each of the elders. Still it would be purely objective. It does not even say they spoke humbly or with resignation.
Chapman is no closer than his successor. He is so galant in fact, that I thought I had found his description in Rochefort. The passage is splendid, but splendidly unhomeric
"All grave old men, and soldiers they had been, but for age
Now left the wars; yet counsellors they were exceed- ingly sage.
And as in well-grown woods, on trees, cold spiny grass- hoppers
*/. e. Clark is "correct," but the words shade differently. 'Hko means low, quiet, with a secondary meaning of "little by little. '' Submisse means low, quiet, with a secondary meaning of modesty, humbly.
Submisse inter se verbis alatis dixerunt
? 326 INSTIGATIONS
Sit chirping, and send voices out, that scarce can pierce our ears
For softness, and their weak faint sounds; so, talking on the tow'r.
These seniors of the people sat; who when they saw the pow'r
Of beauty, in the queen, ascend, ev'n those cold-spirited peers.
Those wise and almost wither'd men, found this heat in their years.
That they were forc'd (though whispering) to say: 'What man can blame
The Greeks and Trojans to endure, for so admir'd a dame.
So many mis'ries, and so long? In her sweet count'nance shine
Looks like the Goddesses. And yet (though never so divine)
Before we boast, unjustly still, of her enforced prise. And justly suffer for her sake, with all our progenies. Labor and ruin, let her go ; the profit of our land Mustpassthebeauty. ' Thus,thoughthesecouldbear
so fit a hand
On their affections, yet, when all their gravest powers
were us'd.
They could not choose but welcome her, and rather they
accus'd
The Gods than beauty; for thus spake the most-fam'd
:"
king of Troy
The last sentence representing mostly 'Qs ftp t<l>a in the line:
*i2s &p i<j>av' Uplafios S' 'EXkvTiv kKaXkffffaro tjiuv^' "Sic dixerunt: Priamus autem Helenam vocavit voce. "
: " :;
? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK 327 Chapman is nearer Swinburne's ballad with:
"But those three following men," etc. than to his alleged original.
Rochefort is as follows {lUade, Livre iii, M. de Rochefort, 1772)
"Helene a ce discours sentit naitre en son ame
Un doux ressouvenir de sa premiere flamme;
Le desir de revoir les lieux qu'elle a quittes
Jette un trouble inconnu dans ses sens agites. Tremblante elle se leve et les yeux pleins de larmes, D'un voile eblouissant elle couvre ses charmes
.
De deux femmes suivie elle vole aux remparts.
La s'etaient assembles ces illustres vieillards
Qui courbes sous le faix des travajix et de I'age N'alloient plus au combat signaler leur courage, Mais qui, pres de leur Roi, par de sages avis, Mieux qu'en leurs jeunes ans defendoient leur pais.
Dans leurs doux entretiens, leur voix toujours egale Ressembloit aux accents que forme la cigale, Lorsqu'aux longs jours d'ete cachee en un buisson, Elle vient dans les champs annoncer la moisson.
Une tendre surprise enflamma leurs visages; Frappes de ses appas, ils se disoient entre eux
'Qui pourroit s'etonner que tant de Rois fameux, Depuis neuf ans entiers aient combattu pour elle? Sur le trone des cieux Venus n'est pas plus belle.
"Mais quelque soit I'amour qu'inspirent ses attraits, Puisse lUion enfin la perdre pour jamais, Puisse-t-elle bientot a son epoux rendue.
Conjurer I'infortune en ces lieux attendue. '
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? 328 INSTIGATIONS
Hugues Salel (1545), praised by Ronsard, is more pleasing
"Le Roi Priam, et auec luy bon nombre De grandz Seigneurs estoient a I'ombre Sur les Crenaulx, Tymoetes et Pahthus, Lampus, Clytus, excellentz en vertus, Hictaon renomme en bataille, Ucalegon iadis de fort taille,
Et Antenor aux armes nompareil
Mais pour alors ne seruantz qu'en conseil.
La, ces Vieillards assis de peur du Hasle Causoyent ensemble ainsi que la Cignalle Ou deux ou trois, entre les vertes fueilles. En temps d'Este gazouillant a merveilles; Lesquelz voyans la diuine Gregeoise, Disoient entre eux que si la grande noise De ces deux camps duroit longe saision, Certainement ce n'estoit sans raision:
Veu la Beaulte, et plus que humain outrage. Qui reluysoit en son diuin visaige.
Ce neantmoins il vauldrait mieulx la rendre, (Ce disoyent ilz) sans gueres plus attendre. Pour eviter le mal qui peult venir,
Qui la voudra encores retenir. "
Salel is a most delightful approach to the Iliads; he is still absorbed in the subject-matter, as Douglas and Golding were absorbed in their subject-matter. Note how exact he is in the rendering of the old men's mental attitude. Note also that he is right in his era. I mean simply that Homer is a little rustre, a . little, or perhaps a good deal, mediaeval, he has not the dovetailing of Ovid. Hehasonomatopoeia,asofpoetrysungout;he
? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK
329
has authenticity of conversation as would be demanded by an intelligent audience not yet laminated with aesthetics; capable of recognizing reality. He has the repetitions of the chanson de geste. Of all the French and English versions I think Salel alone gives any hint ofsomeofthesecharacteristics. Tooobviouslyheisnot onomatopoeic, no. But he is charming, and readable, and "Briseis Fleur des Demoiselles" has her reality.
Nicolo Valla is, for him who runs, closer:
"Consili virtus, summis de rebus habebant
Sermones, et multa inter se et magna loquentes, Arboribus quales gracili stridere cicadse
Ssepe solent cantu, postquam sub moenibus altis Tyndarida aspiciunt, procerum tum quisque fremebat, Mutuasque exorsi, Decuit tot funera Teucros Argolicasque pati, longique in tempore bellum
Tantus in ore decor cui non mortalis in artus
Est honor et vultu divina efflagrat imago.
Diva licet fades, Danauum cum classe recedat
' Longius excido ne nos aut nostra fatiget Pignora sic illi tantis de rebus agebant. "
This hexameter is rather heavily accented. It shows, perhaps, the source of various "ornaments" in later Eng- lish and French translations. It has indubitable sonority even though monotonous.
It is the earliest Latin verse rendering I have yet come upon, and is bound in with Raphael of Volterra's first two Iliads, and some further renderings by Obsopeo.
Odyssea (Liber primus) (1573).
"Die mihi musa uirum captae post tempora Troiae Qui mores hominum multorum uidit et urbes
? 330
INSTIGATIONS
Multa quoque et ponto passus dum naufragus errat Ut sibi turn sociis uitam seruaret in alto
Non tamen hos cupens fato deprompsit acerbo
Ob scelus admissum extinctos ausumque malignum Qui fame compulsu solis rapuere iuvencos
Stuiti ex quo reditum ad patrias deus abstulit oras. Horum itaque exitium memora mihi musa canenti. "
Odyssea (Lib. sec. ) (1573).
"Cumprimum effulsit roseis aurora quadrigis Continuo e stratis proles consurgit Ulyxis Induit et uestes humerosque adcomodat ensem Molia denin pedibus formosis uincula nectit Parque dec egrediens thalamo praeconibus omnis Concilio cognant extemplo mandat Achaeos
Ipse quoque ingentem properabat ad aedibus hastam Corripiens : gemenique canes comitantor euntem Qtiumque illi mirum Pallas veneranda decorem Preberer populus venientem suspicit omnis
Inque throno patrio ueteres cessere sedenti. "
The charm of Salel is continued in the following ex- cerpts. They do not cry out for comment. I leave Ogilby's English and the lines of Latin to serve as con- trast or cross-light.
Iliade (Livre I). Hugues Salel (1545). *
THE IRE
"Je te supply Deesse. gracieuse, Vouloir chanter I'lre pernicieuse,
* Later continued by I'Abbe de St. Cherrou,
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? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK
331
Dont Achille fut tellement espris.
Que par icelle, ung grand nombre d'espritz Des Princes Grecs, par dangereux encombres, Feit lors descente aux infernales Umbres. , Et leurs beaulx Corps privez de Sepulture Furent aux chiens et aux oiseaulx pasture. "
Iliade (Lib. III). John Ogilby (1660).
HELEN
"Who in this chamber, sumpteously adornd Sits on your ivory bed, nor could you say,
By his rich habit, he had fought to-day
A reveller or masker so comes drest.
From splendid sports returning to his rest. Thus did love's Queen warmer desires prepare. But when she saw her neck so heavenly faire, Her lovely bosome and celestial eyes.
Amazed, to the Goddess, she replies
Why wilt thou happless me once more betray, And to another wealthy town convey,
Where some new favourite must, as now at Troy With utter loss of honour me enjoy. "
Iliade (LivreVI). Salel.
GLAUCUS RESPOND A DIOMfiDE
"Adonc Glaucus, auec grace et audace, Luy respoftdit: 'T'enquiers tu de ma race? Le genre humain est fragile et muable Comme la fueille et aussi peu durable.
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? 332
INSTIGATIONS
Car tout ainsi qu'on uoit les branches uertes Sur le printemps de fueilles bien couuertes Qui par les uents d'automne et la froidure Tombent de I'arbre et perdent leur uerdure Puis de rechef la gelee passee,
II en reuient a la place laissee
Ne plus ne moins est du lignage humain: Tel est buy uif qui sera mort demain.
S'il en meurt ung, ung autre reuint naistre.
"
Iliade (Lib. VI). As in Virgil, Dante, and others.
"Quasim gente rogas ? Quibus et natalibus ortus ? Persimile est foliis hominum genus omne caduciis Quae nunc nata uides, pulchrisque, uirescere sylvis Automno ueniente cadunt, simul ilia perurens Incubuit Boreas : quaedam sub uerna renasci Tempora, sic uice perpetua succrescere lapsis, Semper item nova, sic alliis obeuntibus, ultro Succedunt alii luuenes aetate grauatis.
Quod si forte iuvat te qua sit quisque suorum Stirpe satus, si natales cognoscere quaeris
Forte meos, referam, quae sunt notissima multis. "
Iliade (Livre IX). Salel.
CALYDON
"En Calydon regnoit Oeneus, ung bon Roy qui donnoit
De ses beaulx Fruictz chascun an les Primices Aux Immortelz, leur faisant Sacrifices.
Voyla comment se conserue leur estre. '
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? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK
333
Or il aduint (ou bien par son uouloir,
Ou par oubly) qU'il meit a nonchalloir
Diane chaste, et ne luy feit offrande,
Dont elle print Injiignation grande
Encontre luy, et pour bien le punir
Feit ung Sanglier dedans ses Champs uenir Horrible et fier qui luy feit grand dommage Tuant les Gens et gastant le Fruictage. Maintz beaulx Pomiers, maintz Arbres reuestuz De Fleur et Fruict, en furent abattuz,
Et de la Dent aguisee et poinctue,
Le Bled gaste et la Vigne tortue.
Meleager, le Filz de ce bon Roy,
Voyant ainsi le piteux Desarroy
De son Pays et de sa Gent troublee
Proposa lors de faire une Assemblee
De bons Veneurs et Leutiers pour chasser L'horrible Beste et sa Mort pourchasser.
Ce qui fut faict. Maintes Gens I'y trouverent Qui contre luy ses Forces eprouverent
Mjais a la fin le Sanglier inhumain Recent la Mort de sa Royale Main. Estant occis, deux grandes Nations Pour la Depouille eurent Contentions Les Curetois disoient la meriter, Ceulx d'Etolie en uouloient heriter. "
Iliade (Livre X). Salel.
THE BATHERS
"Quand Ulysses fut en la riche tente Du compaignon, alors il diligente
? 334
INSTIGATIONS
De bien lier ses cheuaulx et les loge Soigneusement dedans la meme loge
Et au rang meme ou la belle monture
Du fort Gregeois mangeoit pain et pasture Quand aux habitz de Dolon, il les pose Dedans la nef, sur la poupe et propose En faire ung jour a Pallas sacrifice,
Et luy oflFrir a jamais son seruice
Bien tost apres, ces deux Grecs de ualeur
Se cognoissant oppressez de chaleur,
Et de sueur, dedans la mer entrerent
Pour se lauer, et tres bien so froterent
Le col, le dos, les jambes et les cuisses, Ostant du corps toutes les immondices, Estans ainsi refreichiz et bien netz,
Dedans des baingz souefs bien ordonnez,
S'en sont entrez, et quand leurs corps
Ont este oinctz d'huyle par le dehors.
Puis sont allez manger prians Minerue Qu'en tous leurs faictz les dirige et conserue En respandant du uin a pleine tasse,
(pour sacrifice) au milieu de la place. "
II. ANDREAS DIVUS
In the year of grace 1906, '08, or '10 I picked from the Paris quais a Latin version of the Odyssey by An- dreas Divus Justinopolitanus (Parisiis, In officina Chris- tiani Wecheli, M,D, XXXVIII), the volume containing also the Batrachomyomachia, by Aldus Manutius, and the "Hymni Deorum" rendered by Georgius Dartona Cretensis. IlostaLatinIliadsfortheeconomyoffour francs, these coins being at that tirne scarcer with me
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? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK
335
than they ever should be with any man of my tastes and abilities.
In 191 1 the Italian savant, Signore E. Teza, published his note, "Quale fosse la Casata di Andreas Divus Jus- tinopolitanus ? " This question I am unable to answer, nor do I greatly care by what name Andreas was known in the privacy of his life: Signore Dio, Signore Divino, or even Mijnheer van Gott may have served him as patronymic. Sannazaro, author of De Partu Virginis, and also of the epigram ending hanc et sugere, trans- latedhimselfasSanctusNazarenus; Iammyselfknown as Signore Sterlina to James Joyce's children, while the phonetic translation of my name into the Japanese tongue is so indecorous that I am seriously advised not to use it, lest it do me harm in Nippon. (Rendered back ad ver'bum into our maternal speech it gives for its mean- ing,"Thispictureofaphalluscoststenyen. " Thereis no surety in shifting personal names from one idiom to another. )
Justinopolis is identified as Capodistria; what matters is Divus' text. We find for the "Nekuia" {Odys. xi) "At postquam ad navem descendimus, et mare,
Nauem quidem primum deduximus in mare diuum, Et malum posuimus et vela in navi nigra:
Intro autem ones accipientes ire fecimus, intro et ipsi luimus dolentes, huberes lachrymas fundentes: Nobis autem a tergo navis nigrae prorse
Prosperum ventum imisit pandentem velum bonum amicum
Circe benecomata gravis Dea altiloqua.
Nos autem arma singula expedientes in navi Sedebamus: hanc autem ventusque gubernatorque
dirigebat
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? 336 INSTIGATIONS
Huius at per totum diem extensa sunt vela pontum transientis
Occidit tunc Sol, ombratae sunt omnes vise:
Haec autem in fines pervenit profundi Oceani:
Illic autem Cimmeriorum virorum populusque civi-
tasque,
Caligine et nebula cooperti, neque unquam ipsos
Sol lucidus aspicit radiis,
Neque quando tendit ad ccelum stellatum,
Neque quando retro in terram a coelo vertitur
Sed nox pernitiosa extenditur miseris hominibus: Navem quidem illuc venientes traximus, extra autem
oves
Accepimus: ipsi autem rursus apud fluxum Oceani luimus, ut in locum perveniremus quem dixit Circe: Hie sacra quidem Perimedes Eurylochusque
Faciebant : ego autem ensem acutum trahens a foemore, Foveam fodi quantum cubiti mensura hinc et inde Circum ipsam autem libamina fundimus omnibus mor-
tuis;
Primum mulso, postea autem dulci vino:
Tertio rursus aqua, et farinas albas miscui
Multum autem oravi mortuorum infirma capita: Profectus in Ithicam, sterilem bovem, quae optima
esset,
Sacrificare in domibus, pyramque implere bonis: Tiresise autem seorsum ovem sacrificare vovi
Totam nigram, quae ovibus antecellat nostris:
Has autem postquam votis precationibusque gentes
mortuorum
Precatus sum, oves autem accipiens obtruncavi:
In fossam fluebat autem sanguis niger, congregataeque
sunt
Animae ex Erebo cadaverum mortuorum.
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337
Nymphseque iuvenesque et multa passi senes, Virginesque tenerse, nuper flebilem animum habentes, Multi autem vulnerati sereis lanceis
Viri in bello necati, cruenta arma habentes.
Qui multi circum foveam veniebant aliunde alius Magno clamore, me autem pallidus timor cepit.
lam postea socios hortans iussi
Pecora, quae iam iacebant iugulata ssevo sere, Excoriantescombuere: supplicareautemDiis,
Fortiqiue Plutoni, et laudatae Proserpinse.
At ego ensem acutum trahens a foemore,
Sedi, neque permisi mortuorum impotentia capita Sanguinem prope ire, antequam Tiresiam audirem: Prima autem anima Elpenoris venit socii:
Nondum enim sepultus erat sub terra lata.
Corpus enim in domo Circes reliquimus nos
Infletum et insepultum, quoniam labor alius urgebat: Hunc quidem ego lachrymatus sum videns, misertusque
sum aio,
Et ipsum clamando verba velocia allocutus sum
Elpenor,quomodovenistisubcaliginemobscuram: . Praevenisti pedes existens quam ego in navi nigra?
Sic dixi : hie autem mini lugens respondit verbo
Nobilis Laertiade, prudens Ulysse,
Nocuit mihi dei fatum malum, et multum vinum: Circes autem in domo dormiens, non animadverti
Me retrogradum descendere eundo p6r scalam longam, Sed contra murum cecidi ast autem mihi cervix Nervorum fracta est, anima autem in infernum
descendit
Nunc autem his qui venturi sunt postea precor non
prsesentibus
Per uxorem et patrem, qui educavit parvum existentem, Telemachumque quem solum in domibus reliquisti.
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? 338 INSTIGATIONS
Scio enim quod hinc iens domo ex inferni
Insulam in ^aeam impellens benefabricatam navim: Tunc te postea Rex iubeo recordari mei
Ne me infletum, insepultum, abiens retro, relinquas Separatus, ne deorum ira fiam
Sed me combure con armis qusecunque mihi sunt, Sepulchramque mihi accumula cani in litore maris, Viri infelicis, et cuius apud posteros fama sit: Haecque mihi perfice, figeque in sepulchre remimi, Quo et vivus remigabam existens cum meis sociis.
Sic dixit : at ego ipsum, respondens, allocutus sum Haec tibi infelix perficiamque et faciam
Nos quidem sic verbis respondentes molestis Sedebamus: ego quidem seperatim supra sanguinem
ensem tehebam:
Idolum autem ex altera parte socii multa Ipquebatur Venit autem insuper anima matris mortuas
Autolyci filia magnanimi Anticlea,
Quam vivam dereliqui iens ad Ilium sacrum,
Hac quidem ego lachrymatus sum videns miseratusque
sum aio:
Sed neque sic sivi priorem licet valde dolens Sanguinem prope ire, antequam Tiresiam audirem: Venit autem insuper anima Thebani Tiresise,
Aureum sceptrum tenens, me autem novit et allocuta
est:
Cur iterum o infelix linquens lumen Solis
Venisti, ut videas mortuos, et iniucundam regionem? Sed recede a fossa, remove autem ensem acutum, Sanguinem ut bibam, et tibi vera dicam.
Sic dixi : ego autem retrocedens, ensem argenteum Vagina inclusi: hie autem postquam bibit sanguinem
nigrum,
Et tunc iam me verbis allocutus est vates verus:
--
? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK
339
Reditum quseris dulcem illustris Ulysse:
Hanc autem tibi difficilem faciet Deus, non enim
puto
Latere Neptunum, quam iram imposuit animo Iratus, quem ei filium dilectum excaecasti:
Sed tamen et sic mala licet passi pervenientis,
Si volveris tuum animum continere et sociorum. "
The meaning of the passage is, with a few abbrevia- tions, as I have iiiterpolated it in my Third Canto.
"And then went down to the ship, set keel to breakers, Forth on the godly sea.
We set up mast and sail on the swart ship.
Sheep bore we aboard her, and our bodies also.
Heavy with weeping; and winds from sternward
Bore us out onward with bellying canvas,
Circe's this craft, the trim-coifed goddess.
Then sat we amidships--wind jamming the tiller Thus with stretched sail we went over sea till day's end. Sun to his slumber, shadows o'er all the ocean.
Came we then to the bounds of deepest water,
To the Kimmerian lands and peopled cities
Covered with close-webbed mist, unpierced ever
, With glitter of sun-rays.
Nor with stars stretched, nor looking back from heaven, Swartest night stretched over wretched men there. The ocean flowing backward, came we then to the place Aforesaid by Circe.
Here did they rites, Perimedes and Eurylochus,
And drawing sword from my hip
I dug the ell-square pitkin.
Poured we libations unto each the dead.
:
? 340 INSTIGATIONS
First mead and then sweet wine, water mixed with white flour,
Then prayed I many a prayer to the sickly death's- heads.
As set in Ithaca, sterile bulls of the best
For sacrifice, heaping the pyre with goods.
Sheep, to Tiresias only; black and a bell sheep.
Dark blood flowed in the fosse,
Souls out of Erebus, cadaverous dead.
Of brides, of youths, and of much-bearing old ;
Virgins tender, souls stained with recent tears,
Many men mauled with bronze lance-heads,
Battle spoil, bearing yet dreary arms.
These many crowded about me.
With shouting, pallor upon me, cried to my men for
more beasts.
Slaughtered the herds, sheep slain of bronze,
Poured ointment, cried to the gods.
To Pluto the strong, and praised Proserpine, Unsheathed the narrow sword,
I sat to keep off the impetuous, impotent dead
Till I should hear Tiresias.
But first Elpenor came, our friend Elpenor, Unburied, cast on the wide earth,
Limbs that we left in the house of Circe,
Unwept, unwrapped in sepulchre, since toils urged
other.
Pitiful spirit, and I cried in hurried speech: 'Elpenor, how art thou come to this dark coast? Cam'st thou a-foot, outstripping seamen? '
And he in heavy speech '111 fate and abundant wine! I slept in Circe's ingle,
Going down the long ladder unguarded, I fell against the buttress,
? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK '^341
Shattered the nape-nerve, the soul sought Avernus. But thou, O King, I bid remember me, unwept, un-
buried.
Heap up mine arms, be tomb by sea-board, and in-
scribed :
"A man of no fortune and with a name to come. "
And set my oar up, that I swung mid fellows. '
Came then another ghost, whom I beat off, Anticlea, And then Tiresias, Theban,
Holding his golden wand, knew me and spoke first: 'Man of ill hour, why come a second time.
Leaving the sunlight, facing the sunless dead, and this
joyless region?
Stand from the fosse, move back, leave me my bloody
bever.
And I will speak you true speeches. '
And I stepped back, Sheathing the yellow sword. Dark blood he drank
then.
And spoke : 'Lustrous Odysseus
Shalt return through spiteful Neptune, over dark seas.
Lose all companions. ' Foretold me the ways and the signs.
Came then Anticlea, to whom I answered:
'Fate drives me on through these deeps. I sought
Tiresias,'
ToldherthenewsofTroy. Andthricehershadow Faded in my embrace. "
It takes no more Latin than I have to know that Divus' Latin is not the Latin of Catullus and Ovid; that it is illepidus to chuck Latin nominative participles about in suchprofusion; thatRomansdidnotusehdbentesasthe Greeks used ixovTti, etc. And nos in line 53 is un-
? 342 INSTIGATIONS
necessary. Divus' Latin has, despite these wems, its quality; itisevensingable,thereareconstantsuggestions of the poetic motion; it is very simple Latin, after all, and a crib of this sort may make just the difference of permitting a man to read fast enough to get the swing and mood of the subject, instead of losing both in a dictionary.
Even habentes when one has made up one's mind to it, together with less obvious exoticisms, does not upset one as
"the steep of Delphos leaving. "
One is, of necessity, more sensitive to botches in one's own tongue than to botches in another, however care- fully learned.
For all the fuss about Divus' errors of elegance Samuelis Clarkius and Jo. Augustus Ernestus do not seem to have gone him much better---with two hundred years extra Hellenic scholarship at their disposal.
The first Aldine Greek Iliads appeared I think in 1504, Odyssey possibly later. * My edition of Divus is of 1538, and as it contains Aldus' own translation of the Frog-fight, it may indicate that Divus was in touch with Aldus in Italy, or quite possibly the French edition is
pirated from an earlier Italian printing. A Latin Odyssey in some sort of verse was at that time in- finitely worth doing.
Raphael of Volterra had done a prose Odyssey with the opening lines of several books and a few other brief
* My impression is that I saw an Iliad by Andreas Divus on the Quais in Paris, at the time I found his version of the Odys- sey, but an impression of this sort is, after eight years, un- trustworthy, it may have been only a Latin Iliad in similar binding.
:
? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK
343
passages in verse. This was printed with Laurenzo Valla's prose Iliads as early as 1502. He begins:
"Die mihi musa virum captae post tempora Troiae Qui mores hominum multorum vidit et urbes Multa quoque et ponto passus dum naufragus errat Ut sibi turn sotiis (sociis) vitam servaret in alto Non tamen hos cupiens fato deprompsit acerbo. "
Probably the source of "Master Watson's" English quantitative couplet, but obviously not copied by Divus:
"Virum mihi die musa multiseium qui valde multum Erravit ex quo Troiae saeram urbem depop,ulatus est: Multorum autem virorum vidit urbes et mentem
cognovit
Multos autem hie in mare passus est dolores, suo in
animo,
Liberans suamque animam et reditum sociorum. "
On the other hand, it is nearly impossible to believe that Clark and Ernestus were unfamiliar with Divus. Clark calls his Latin crib a composite "non elegantem utique et venustam, sed ita Romanam, ut verbis ~verba. " A good deal of Divus' venustas has departed. Clark's hyphenated compounds are, I think, no more Roman than are some of Divus' coinage; they may be a trifle more explanatory, but if we read a shade more of color into &dtff<t>aTos olvos than we can into multum vinum, it is not restored to us in Clark's copiosum vinum, nor does terra spatiosa improve upon terra lata, tipvBelris being (if anjrthing more than lata) : "with wide ways or streets," the wide ways of the world, traversable, open towanderers. TheparticiplesremaininClark-Ernestus,
: : : :
? 344
INSTIGATIONS
manyofthecoinedwordsremainunchanged. Georgius Dartona gives, in the opening of the second hymn to Aphrodite
"Venerandam auream coronam habentem pulchram Venerem
Canam, quae totius Cypri munimenta sortita est Maritimae ubi illam zephyri vis molliter spirantis Suscitavit per undam multisoni maris,
Spuma in molli: banc autem auricurae Horae Susceperunt hilariter, immortales autem vestes in-
duere
Capite vero super immortali coronam bene construc-
tam posuere
Pulchram, auream: tribus autem ansis Donum orichalchi aurique honorabilis CoUum autem moUe, ac pectora argentea Monilibus aureis ornabant . . . " etc.
Ernestus, adding by himself the appendices to the Epics, gives us
"Venerandam auream coronam habentem pulchram Venerem
Canam, quae totius Cypri munimenta sortita est Maritimae, ubi illam zephyri vis molliter spirantis Tulit per undam multisoni maris
Spuma in molli: banc autem auro comam refigatae
Horae
Susceperunt hilariter, immortales autem vestes in-
duere
Caput autem super immortale coronam bene construc-
tam posuere
;
? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK
345
Pulchram, auream, perforatis autem auriculis Donum orichalci preciosi:
CoUum autem molle ac pectora Candida* Monilibus aureis ornabant . . . " etc.
"Which things since they are so" lead us to feel that we would have had no less respect for Messrs. Clarkius and Ernestus if they had deigned to mention the names oftheirpredecessors. Theyhavenotdonethisintheir prefaces, and if any mention is made of the sixteenth- century scholars, it is very effectually buried somewhere in the voluminous Latin notes, which I have not gone throughintoto. Theiredition(Glasgow,1814)is,how- ever, most serviceable.
TRANSLATION OF AESCHYLUS
A SEARCH for Aeschylus in English is deadly, ac- cursed, mind-rending. Browning has "done" the Aga- memnon, or "done the Agamemnon in the eye" as the criticmaychoosetoconsider. Hehaswrittenamodest and an apparently intelligent preface:
"I should hardly look for an impossible transmission of the reputed magniloquence and sonority of the Greek and this with the less regret, inasmuch as there is abun- dant musicality elsewhere, but nowhere else than in his poem the ideas of the poet. "
He quotes Matthew Arnold on the Greeks : "their ex- pression is so excellent, because it is so simple and so well subordinated, because it draws its force directly from the pregnancy of the matter which it conveys . . . not a word wasted, not a sentiment capriciously thrown in, stroke on stroke. "
* Reading ipyv(piourtii, variant ipyupkouriv, offered in footnote. In any case argentea is closer than Candida.
--
? 346 INSTIGATIONS
He is reasonable about the Greek spelling. He points out that tbvov iBav KaXKiffrov avdpSiv sounds very poorly as "Seeing her son the fairest of men'' but is out- shouted in "Remirando il figliuolo bellissimo degli uomini," and protests his fidelity to the meaning of Aeschylus.
His weakness in this work is where it essentially lay in all of his expression, it rests in the term "ideas" "Thought" as Browning understood it--"ideas" as the term is current, are poor two dimensional stuff, a scant, scratch covering. "Damn ideas, anyhow. " An idea is only an imperfect induction from fact.
The solid, the "last atom of force verging off into the first atom of matter" is the force, the emotion, the ob- jective sight of the poet. In the Agamemnon it is the whole rush of the action, the whole wildness of Kassan- dra's continual shrieking, the flash of the beacon fires burning unstinted wood, the outburst of
Tpoiav Axaiwv oiaav,
or the later
Tpoiav 'Axatot rr/S' exova' iv iiTtpa.
"Troy is the greeks'. " Even Rossetti has it better than Browning: "Troy's down, tall Troy's on fire," anything, literally anything that can be shouted, that can be shouted uncontrolledly and hysterically. "Troy is the Greeks' " is an ambiguity for the ear. "Know that our men are in Ilion. "
Anything but a stilted unsayable jargon. Yet with Browning we have
:
? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK "Troia the Achaioi hold," and later,
"Troia do the Achaioi hold," followed by
"this same day
I think a noise--no mixture--reigns i' the city
Sour wine and unguent pour thou in one vessel
1347
Anditdoesnotendhere. Infactitreachesthenadirof its bathos in a later speech of Klutaimnestra in the line
"The perfect man his home perambulating! "
We may add several exclamation points to the one which Mr. Browning has provided. But then all translation is a thankless, or is at least most apt to be a thankless and desolate undertaking.
What Browning had not got into his sometimes ex- cellent top-knot was the patent, or what should be the patent fact that inversions of sentence order in an unin- flected language like English are not, simply and utterly are not any sort of equivalent for inversions and per- turbations of order in a language inflected as Greek and Latin are inflected. That is the chief source of his error. In these inflected languages order has other cur- rents than simple sequence of subject, predicate, object; and all sorts of departures from this Franco-English natural position are in Greek and Latin neither confus-
ing nor delaying ; they may be both simple and emphatic, they do not obstruct one's apperception of the verbal relations.
Obscurities not inherent in the matter, obscurities due not to the thing but to the wording, are a botch, and are
"
? 348 INSTIGATIONS
not worth preserving in a translation. The work lives not by them but despite them.
Rossetti is in this matter sounder than Browning, when he says that the only thing worth bringing over is the beauty of the original; and despite Rossetti's pur- ple plush and molasses trimmings he meant by "beauty" something fairly near what we mean by the "emotional intensity" of his original.
Obscvurities (inherent in the thing occur when the author is piercing, or trying to pierce into, uncharted regions ; when he is trying to express things not yet current, not yet worn into phrase; when he is ahead of the emotional, or philosophic sense (as a painter might be ahead of the color-sense) of his contemporaries.
As for the word-sense and phrase-sense, we still hear workmen and peasants and metropolitan bus-riders re- peating the simplest sentences three and four times, back and forth between interlocutors : trying to get the sense "I sez to Bill, I'm goin' to 'Arrow" or some other such subtlety from one occiput into another.
"You sez to Bill, etc. " "Yus, I sez . . . etc. "
! "
"O
The first day's search at the Museum reveals "Aeschylus" printed by Aldus in 1518; by Stephanus in 1557, no English translation before 1777, a couple in the 1820's, more in the middle of the century, since 1880 past counting, and no promising names in the list. Sophocles falls to Jebb and does not appear satisfactory.
From which welter one returns thankfully to the Thomas Stanley Greek and Latin edition, with Saml. Butler's notes, Cambridge, "typis ac sumptibus acade- micis," 1811--once a guinea or half a guinea per vol- ume, half leather, but now mercifully, since people no
:
? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK
349
longer read Latin, picked up at 2s. for the set (eight volumes in all), rather less than the price of their postage. Quartos in excellent type.
Browning shows himself poet in such phrases as "dust, mud's thirsty brother," which is easy, perhaps, but is English, even Browning's own particular English, as "dust, of mud brother thirsty," would not be English at all; and if I have been extremely harsh in dealing with the first passage quoted it is still undisputable that I have^readJBrowning off and on fqrjeycnteati, years with no small pleasure and admiration, and am one of the few people who know anything about his Sordello, and have never read his Agamemnon, have not even now when it falls into a special study been able to get through his Agamemnon.
Take another test passage
OStos kaiv Ayaftkuvuv, k/xds ILSais, veKpds Sk rrjaSe de|ias x<<P^s
"Epyov SiKalvas riKTOvos. Tad' SiS ? x<<- ^415
"Hicce est Agamemnon, maritus Mens, hac dextra mortuus,
Facinus justae artificis. Haec ita se habent. " We turn to Browning and find:
"--^this man is Agamemnon,
My husband, dead, the work of this right hand here. Aye, of a just artificer : so things are. "
To the infinite advantage of the Latin, and the com- plete explanation of why Browning's Aeschylus, to say nothing of forty other translations of Aeschylus, is un- readable.
? INSTIGATIONS Any bungling translation:
"This is Agamemnon, My husband,
Dead by this hand.
And a good job. These, gentlemen, are the facts. "
No, that is extreme, but the point is that any natural wording, anything which keeps the mind off theatricals and on Klutaimnestra actual, dealing with an actual situation, and not pestering the reader with frills and festoons of language, is worth all the convoluted tush- ery that the Victorians can heap together.
I can conceive no improvement on the Latin, it saves by dextra for 5e|ta$ x^posi it loses a few letters in "se habent," but it has the same drive as the Greek.
The Latin can be a whole commentary on the Greek, or at least it can give one the whole parsing and order, and let one proceed at a comforable rate with but the most rudimentary knowledge of the original language. And I do not think this a trifle; it would be an ill day if men again let the classics go by the board; we should fall into something worse than, or as bad as, the counter- reformation: a welter of gum-shoes, and cocoa, and Y. M. C. A. and Webbs, and social theorizing commit- tees, and the general hell of a groggy doctrinaire ob- fuscation; and the very disagreeablizing of the classics, every pedagogy which puts the masterwork further from us, either by obstructing the schoolboy, or breeding af- fectation in dilettante readers, works toward such a detestable end. I do not know that strict logic will cover all of the matter, or that I can formulate anjrthing beyond a belief that we test a translation by the feel, and particularly by the feel of being in contact with
350
! ::
? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK
351
the force of a great original, and it does not seem to me that one can open this Latin text of the Agamemnon without getting such sense of contact
"Mox sciemus lampadum luciferarum
Signorumque per faces et ignis vices,
An vere sint, an somniorum instar,
Gratum veniens illud lumen eluserit animum nostrum. Praeconem hunc a littore video obumbratum Ramisolivae: testaturautemhaecmihifrater
Luti socius aridus pulvis,
Quod neque mutus, neque accendens facem Materiae montanae signa dabit per fumum ignis. "
or
"Apollo, Apollo!
Agyieu Apollo mi
Ah! quo me tandem duxisti? ad qualem domum?
109s
"Heu, heu, ecce, ecce, cohibe a vacca 1134 Taurum: vestibus involens
Nigricornem machina
Percutit; cadit vero in aquali vase.
Insidiosi lebetis casum ut intelligas velim.
Heu, heu, argutae lusciniae fatum mihi tribuis:
"Heu nuptiae, nuptiae Paridis exitiales 1165 Amicis! eheu Scamandri patria unda! "
All this howling of Kassandra comes at one from the page, and the grimness also of the Iambics
"Ohime! lethali intus percussus sum vulnere. " 1352 "Tace: quis clamat vulnus lethaliter vulneratus? "
498
? /352 INSTIGATIONS
"Ohime! iterum secundo ictu sauciatus. "
"Patrari facinus mihi videtur regis ex ejulatu. 1355 "At tuta communicemus consilia. "
"Ego quidem vobis meam dico sententiam," etc.
Here or in the opening of the play, or where you like in this Latin, we are at once in contact with the action, something real is going on, we are keen and curious on the instant, but I cannot get any such impact from any part of the Browning.
"In bellum nuptam,
Auctricem que contentionum, Helenam: 695 Quippe quae congruenter
Perditrix navium, perditrix virorum, perditrix urbium, E delicatis
Thalami ornamentis navigavit
Zephyri terrigenae aura.
Et numerosi scutiferi,
Venatores secundum vestigia,
Remorum inapparentia
Appulerunt ad Simoentis ripas
Foliis abundantes
Ob jurgium cruentum. "
"War-wed, author of strife,
Fitly Helen, destroyer of ships, of men. Destroyer of cities.
From delicate-curtained room
Sped by land breezes.
"Swift the shields on your track. Oars on the unseen traces.
And leafy Simois
? TRANSLATORS OF GREEK Gone red with blood. " *
Contested Helen, 'Aam^imik^.
"War-wed, contested,
(Fitly) Helen, destroyer of ships; of men;
Destroyer of cities,
"From the delicate-curtained room Sped by land breezes.
"Swift on the shields on your track. Oars on the unseen traces.
"Red leaves in Simois! "
"Rank flower of love, for Troy. "
353
"Quippe leonem educavit . . . 726 Mansuetum, pxieris amabilem . .