Erminia:
> I was right, then? (of course the translated fragment was dedicated to
> Lesbia (or else called Clodia+Claudia, sister of the
> powerful Roman Tribune, Clodio! And (corrupted, most beautiful, and
pervert)
> wife of Quinto Metello
Yes, indeed you were. I'd remembered the translation, but hadn't
remembered it mentioned Lesbia by name till I looked it up!
> In the Saffo's fragment translated by Catullo, the jealousy scene is
caused
> by young girl (let's call her Lebia I) sitting by a very very handsome
men
> who would overshadow with his beauty poor Saffo, who remains unnoticed
and
> in despair.
I'm not sure it's Sappho's beauty which is overshadowed, so much as that
she's the wrong sex to be a bridegroom (if you take, as I do [though I
suppose there's no explicit evidence for it in the fragment] the setting of
the poem as a wedding-feast).
Here's my own version of the Sappho fragment:
SAPPHO: Fragment 31
Lucky as any god, that man seems to me,
The one seated there, over across from you,
Bending his head forward, intimate, hearing
all your sweet voice,
Your delicious laughter. It is that, I swear,
Which has started my heart pounding. For when I
Suddenly look up at you, I can command
no power of speaking,
For my tongue is broken; all in a moment
A thin flame is creeping beneath my flesh,
With my eyes I can see nothing, both my ears
thunder with nothing;
A chill sweat has broken out all over me,
And a shuddering possesses me completely;
I am paler than dry grass, seem to myself
hardly alive still.
But all this is sent to me to be endured ...
Cheers
Robin
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