Friday 19 January 2024

Two versions by Aldington: Meleager AP 12.49 and 12.114

On Aldington's poetic career, see https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/richard-aldington. He was a writer of influence. All I have read of him is his Meleager, of which I will say: this was a man who loved his exclamation marks.

Here for instance is his version of 12.49:

Be drunk, unhappy lover, and let Bromius, giver of forgetfulness, lull your burning love!

Be drunk, fill your cup with wine and drive hateful grief from your heart!

Contrast the Loeb, which we should remember was already out there in Aldington's day:

Drink strong wine, thou unhappy lover, and Bacchus, the giver of forgetulness, shall send to sleep the flame of your love for the lad. Drink, and draining the cup full of the vine-juice drive out abhorred pain from thy heart.

It looks to me as if Aldington has leaned on the Loeb, but then, who among us has not? His version is more concise than Paton's, but he gets there by ditching important details. Only the truly desperate resort to unwatered wine, and nothing makes a man more desperate than heartsickness over a lovely boy.

His version of 12.114 also loses a significant detail, this time the fact that the poem concerns a lovely girl:

Hail to you, Morning Star, O messenger of Dawn!

May the Star of Evening come swiftly and bring back the sweet joy you stole away!

 Compare again Paton:

Star of Morning, hail, thou herald of dawn; and mayest thou quickly come again, as the Star of Eve, bringing again in secret her whom [Gr. hēn] thou takest away.

Aldington's versions give us not a boy, not a girl, but whatever romantic object may most please.

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