I'm looking for a decent English translation of Petrarca's/Petrarch's sonnet 90(Erano i capei d'oro a l'aura sparsi).

Sonnet 160 would be nice too (Amor et io sì pien di meraviglia).

Any literature-freak willing to help me?

Are u teaching English?

My Norton Anthology of World Literature has this as a translation:

She used to let her golden hair fly free
For the wind to toy and tangle and molest;
Her eyes were brighter than the radiant west.
(Seldom they shine so now.) I used to see

Pity looking out of those deep eyes on me.
("It was false pity," you would now protest.)
I had love's tinder heaped within my breast;
What wonder that the flame burned furiously?

She did not walk in any mortal way,
But with angelic progress; when she spoke,
Unearthly voices sang in unison.

She seemed divine among the dreary folk
Of earth. You say she is not so today?
Well, though the bow's unbent, the wound bleeds on.

trans. by Morris Bishop.

I think it's fair to say I'd be unable to contribute anything to this thread.

Fauxie said:

Yes. It's a lesson about Shakespeare's sonnet 130, in fact. To be able to show how special (or even disturbing) this sonnet is, you have to trace it down to its roots, Petrarch. I've given this lesson some weeks ago, but I'm not happy with the Petrarchan sonnet I used. The problem is that I only have them in a Dutch translation, and the internet is so full of shit.

2the9s said:

Thanks !
Norton Anthology is ok, this is sure a book I can add to my list of sources. Could you please give me the page in Norton? I only have the Norton of English literature here, maybe I should consider to buy this one too!

MarieLouise said:

Interesting connection. The line in Shakespeare's sonnet 130 ("I also never saw a goddess walk;") and line 9 in the Petrarch sonnet are both derived (or echo) a scene in Virgil where Aeneas sees Venus and knows by her walk that she is a goddess. Pound makes mention of this scene on several ocassions.
[Edited 3/13/05 7:17am]

MarieLouise said:

It's page 1676.

This is The Norton Anthology of World Masterpieces. 7th ed. Volume 1

2the9s said:

Wow ! You just know this from the top of your head? Or are you googling?

2the9s said:

I've started a thread about this material some weeks ago. The problem is that it is very interesting, and you could can dig deeper and deeper. But the group I will be teaching tomorrow is a group of 16 year olds, who never read any Shakespeare, and certainly no Petrarch either ! So I have to make it understandable to them. That's why I start by pointing out that this Petrarchan tradition is still vivid nowadays. I'll let them listen to 'Jolene'

Your beauty is beyond compare,
with flaming locks of auburn hair
With ivory skin and eyes of emerald green

Your smile is like a breath of spring
Your voice is soft like summer rain
And I cannot compete with you, Jolene

MarieLouise said:

I've done a lot of work on Pound.

But the note to line 9 in the Norton points out the connection to Virgil:



That second sentence is useless in the way academic writing often is

All three writers are struck by her movement. "It's about the walk."

Can anyone direct me to the nearest "What colour is your underwear?" thread?

doctormcmeekle said:

Her underwear is the color of beaten gold...

MarieLouise said:

By the way, what do you mean that sonnet 130 is "disturbing"?

2the9s said:

If you can think of other songs that make use of this Petrarchan tradition, please tell me. I asked the same question before, and had a hard time explaining what I meant. By the time I managed to do that, every one was just sleeping and the thread was completely dead !

The class I had to teach this lesson to had just had an awful fight, and the tension was unbearable. Moreover, the cd-player wasn't working. That's why I'll give it a second try, tomorrow's my last lesson, I really hope it will work this time.

2the9s said:

Not really disturbing for us, but for people who only associate Shakespeare with Romeo and Juliet and 'Shall I compare thee to a summer's day', it's rather disturbing. It makes fun of the convention of idealizing the beloved woman and of heavenly love.

To me it's not really disturbing, or strange, but many people who read this poem were like 'wtf, did Shakespeare write something like that???'

MarieLouise said:

Do you have a link to the original thread?

Seriously, what about Prince's It's About That Walk?

Mmm-mmm!
Oooh-wee!
Fellas would U look at that thing
Have U ever...?

U just got back from Paris
U probably went to buy some clothes
U're on your way to Nell's in New York
Gonna meet who? Heaven knows

But it ain't about where U're comin'
It ain't about where U go
It ain't about who U've been with
'Cuz it ain't about who U know

It's about that walk - can we talk about it?
It's about that walk - I wanna shout about it

Oooh-wee!

Your ass like a fine cut diamond
Mounted on 2 legs of stone
The prison I could do some time in
If I ever got that ass alone


When Prince describes his lady's posterior as being not unlike a fine cut diamond set upon two stone legs, he is clearly echoing the Petrarchan-Dantean convention of the "itemization of the beloved." And the fear of being forever separated from that ass is masterfully demonstrated in the final line above, where the empty desire of modernity apotheosizes in a Renaissance conceit.

2the9s said:

I would love to use Prince once again, but the problem is that I've already used 'I could never take the place of your man' in a lesson about modal auxiliaries. I'm supposed to teach English, not Prince.

I don't have a clue how to direct you to this original thread, I'm clumsy you know, but I pretty sure it was called 'Songs in the petrarchan tradition', and it was in the Music Non-Prince forum, about three weeks ago...

i like this thread. i have nothing to contribute but i like reading about stuff like this.

i always loved shakespeare plays and greek mythology but i wish i had some in english that i could understand better-especially that shakespeare dude, his storys are hot stuff!

heybaby said:

Shakespeare is really a very diverse writer, using a very funny, witty and poetical language. I'm not an expert (more specialised in other domains of literature), but it's certainly a challenge to teach this dude's writings !

MarieLouise said:

Here's another translation I found online. This one is more sucky.

http://www.planck.com/rhy...herano.htm



I was looking for other translations, because I don't speak Italian and I was wondering what that first line in Italian means, especially the phrase "l'aura sparsi."

The woman that Petrarch loved as named "Laura," and I think he's hiding her name in this first line.

That old dog.

l'aura is "gold"?

Where's Vampy??

2the9s said:

None of the two translations stays very close to the original Italian, but I think that the second one is indeed worse.
L'aura is the same in English I guess, something like 'radiance, 'glow'...

Anyway, the lesson is over now. I used the first translation. I was alright, although the teacher didn't tell me that the pupils had already discussed sonnet 130 in their Dutch course...

Anyway, anyway, the whole thing is over. My evaluation papers are overall positive, so this means I can teach English and Dutch for real, after the exams are finished that is...

doctormcmeekle said: