Helen 2:75

Je m’en-fuy du combat, ma bataille est desfaite :

J’ay perdu contre Amour la force et la raison :

Ja dix lustres passez, et ja mon poil grison

M’appellent au logis, et sonnent la retraite.

 

Si comme je voulois ta gloire n’est parfaite,

N’en blasme point l’esprit, mais blasme la saison :

Je ne suis ny Pâris, ny desloyal Jason :

J’obeis à la loy que la Nature a faite.

 

Entre l’aigre et le doux, l’esperance et la peur,

Amour dedans ma forge a poly cest ouvrage.

Je ne me plains du mal, du temps ny du labeur,

 

Je me plains de moymesme et de ton faux courage.

Tu t’en repentiras, si tu as un bon cœur,

Mais le tard repentir n’amande le dommage.

 

 

 

                                                                            I flee from the fight, my battle is lost:

                                                                            I have lost, fighting Love, both strength and reason;

                                                                            Fifty years now gone, and now my grey hairs,

                                                                            All call me to rest, and sound the retreat.

 

                                                                            If your glory is not perfected as I wished,

                                                                            Don’t blame my spirit for it, but blame the season:

                                                                            I am neither Paris, nor disloyal Jason;

                                                                            I obey the law which Nature has made.

 

                                                                            Between sour and sweet, hope and fear,

                                                                            Love within my forge has polished this work.

                                                                            I do not complain of trouble, time and labour,

 

                                                                            I complain of myself and of your false courage.

                                                                            You will repent it, if you have a good heart,

                                                                            But late repenting does not mend the loss.

 

 

 

 

And so, the last sonnet to Helen: a mixture of reproach of her, reproach of self, and (inevitably) a claim that in the end it is Helen’s loss… Ronsard is not Paris (failing the original Helen) nor Jason (abandoning Medea) – he has put in the time and trouble, it is Helen who is abandoning him. ‘You will repent it’: I wonder if she did?

 

Of course not! The literary character Hélène might have done so, losing a lover. But the real Hélène had no reason to complain: she has been the centre of attention in two books of France’s finest sonnets; even if portrayed as distant and ungrateful she has been portrayed also as chaste and inaccessible, beautiful and virtuous; and, far from late repenting at the loss of the affair, she has got everything she needed from it – the poems, the fame, the immortality. In fact.as we saw elsewhere, her only complaint was that too many of the poems were recycled from earlier collections!

 

Blanchemain offers a small change in line 1: “Je m’en-fuy du combat, mon armée est desfaite” (‘I flee from the fight, my army is lost’).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Helen 2:40

Comme un vieil combatant qui ne veut plus s’armer,

Ayant le corps chargé de coups et de vieillesse,

Regarde en s’esbatant l’Olympique jeunesse

Pleine d’un sang bouillant aux joustes escrimer :

 

Ainsi je regardois du jeune Dieu d’aimer,

Dieu qui combat tousjours par ruse et par finesse,

Les gaillards champions, qui d’une chaude presse

Se veulent dans le camp amoureux enfermer.

 

Quand tu as reverdy mon escorce ridée

De ta jeune vertu, ainsi que fit Medee

Par herbes et par jus le pere de Jason,

 

Je n’ay contre ton charme opposé ma defense :

Toutefois je me deuls de r’entrer en enfance,

Pour perdre tant de fois l’esprit et la raison.

 

 

 

 

                                                                            Like an old warrior who no longer wants to arm himself,

                                                                            His body laden with wounds and age,

                                                                            Looks back at his Olympian youth spent fighting,

                                                                            Filled with brimming excitement for fencing in competition:

 

                                                                            Just so I looked on the young god of love,

                                                                            The god who always makes war by ruse and trickery

                                                                            On the brave champions who, hotly hurrying,

                                                                            Wish to lock themselves into Love’s camp.

 

                                                                            When you renewed my furrowed hide

                                                                            With your youthful virtue, just as Medea did

                                                                            With her herbs and essences to Jason’s father,

 

                                                                            I did not put up a defence against your magic ;

                                                                            Yet I am saddened at returning once more to childhood,

                                                                            For losing so often my spirit and reason.

 

 

 

There are times when Ronsard starts off as usual, but ends up sounding tired and fed up with it all. And this is one of them. A fine heroic beginning, a good parallel with the ‘war of love’, a strong mythological antecedent for youth-renewing Helen – and then a downturn at the end: youth isn’t everything, jettisoning the wisdom of age for lively spirits might not be such a good trade-off after all …

 

And the reference to Medea is another coded message about the trade-off. Medea certainly promised Jason’s father, Pelias, renewed youth – but he had to be killed to be re-born, and as it turned out Medea’s magic didn’t bring him back to life … So, what is he telling Hélène about her own ‘magic’?

 

Blanchemain offers a number of variants in lines 8-10:

 

 

Les gaillards champions, qui d’une chaude presse

Se veulent en l’arene amoureux enfermer.

 

Quand tu fis reverdir mon escorce ridée

De l’esclair de tes yeux, ainsi que fit Medee

Par herbes et par jus le pere de Jason …

 

 

                                                                            … On the brave champions who, hotly hurrying,

                                                                            Wish to lock themselves into Love’s arena.

 

                                                                            When you made young again my furrowed hide

                                                                            With the lightning of your eyes, just as Medea did

                                                                            With her herbs and essences to Jason’s father …

 

 

Additionally, he offers a further variant in line 10, again changing the form of Hélène’s magic – “De ta charmante voix, ainsi que fit Medee…” – not her virtue or her eyes, but ‘her charming voice’.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Helen 2:32

J’avois esté saigné, ma Dame me vint voir

Lors que je languissois d’une humeur froide et lente :

Se tournant vers mon sang, comme toute riante

Me dist en se jouant, Que vostre sang est noir !

 

Le trop penser en vous a peu si bien mouvoir

L’imagination, que l’ame obeissante

A laissé la chaleur naturelle impuissante

De cuire de nourrir de faire son devoir.

 

Ne soyez plus si belle, et devenez Medée :

Colorez d’un beau sang ma face ja ridée,

Et d’un nouveau printemps faites moy r’animer.

 

Aeson vit rajeunir son escorce ancienne :

Nul charme ne sçauroit renouveller la mienne.

Si je veux rajeunir il ne faut plus aimer.

 

 

                                                                            I’d just been bled when my Lady came to see me,

                                                                            While I was suffering from a cold and indolent humour;

                                                                            Turning towards my blood, as if laughing at me,

                                                                            She said in joke, “How dark your blood is!

 

                                                                            Thinking too much has managed so to move

                                                                            Your imagination that your obedient soul

                                                                            Has lost its natural warmth, unable

                                                                            To heat, to nourish, to do its duty.”

 

                                                                            Oh, be no longer so fair, become Medea;

                                                                            Put colour in my already-lined cheeks with fresh blood,

                                                                            And make me live again with a new springtime.

 

                                                                            Aeson saw his ancient hide rejuvenated;

                                                                            But no magic could renew mine.

                                                                            If I wish to become young again, I must love no more.

 

 

Humours and bleeding – very sixteenth-century, not the medicine we know today. But all pretty elf-explanatory, I think. 

 

A couple of classical names that may not be so clear: Medea and Aeson.

 

Blanchemain to the rescue: ‘Medea, who rejuvenated with her magic the aged Æson’. Aeson was Jason’s (aged) father and, when Jason returned from Colchis with Medea, she did indeed rejuvenate him – by slitting his throat and boiling him in a pot! Aeson emerged , youn g again. It was all a plot to get rid of Pelias who was threatening to oust Aeson: promising to rejuvenate him too, Medea killed and boiled him – but without bringing him back to life.

 

Hence the references to blood, fresh and good, a new springtime, and magic. The names may also be familiar from a modern form of magic – Aeson is a parsing library for JSON (get it?), and named from these myths.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Amours 2:56

Ne me suy point, Belleau, allant à la maison

De celle qui me tient en douleur nompareille :

Ignores-tu les vers chantez par la Corneille

A Mopse qui suivoit la trace de Jason ?

 

Prophete, dist l’oiseau, tu n’as point de raison

De suivre cest amant qui tout seul s’appareille

« D’aller voir ses amours : malheureux qui conseille,

« Et qui suit un amant quand il n’en est saison.

 

Pour ton profit, Belleau, que ton regard ne voye

Celle qui par les yeux la playe au cœur m’envoye,

De peur qu’il ne reçoive un mal au mien pareil.

 

Il suffist que sans toy je sois seul miserable :

Reste sain je te pri’ pour estre secourable

A ma douleur extreme, et m’y donner conseil.

 

 

 

                                                                            Don’t follow me, Belleau, as I go to the home

                                                                            Of the lady who keeps me in unequalled sadness.

                                                                            Do you not know the song sung by the crow

                                                                            To Mopsus, as he was following Jason’s footsteps ?

 

                                                                            “Prophet,” said the bird, “you are completely wrong

                                                                            To follow this lover who is sailing alone

                                                                            To visit his beloved : ‘misfortune to him who advises

                                                                            And who follows a lover at the wrong times’.”

 

                                                                            For your profit, Belleau, may your eyes not see

                                                                            Her who through her eyes sent this wound into my heart,

                                                                            For fear that yours may receive troubles equal to mine.

 

                                                                            Enough that I alone, and not you, am wretched:

                                                                            Stay healthy, I beg, to be a help

                                                                            In my extreme sadness, and to give me advice.

 

 

Although Ronsard claimed he was being less sophisticated in his classical allusions when writing the Marie poems, it seems he could not stop himself! Fortunately Belleau comes to the rescue, telling us in his commentary what we are supposed to understand from the allusion: “In the third book of the Argonauts [Argonautica], Apollonius Rhodius tells how Jason, having planned one day to see Medea, took with him Mopsus the great seer. However Juno, who favoured Jason, knowing he would get no courtesy from Medea if she found he was accompanied, made a crow and taught it to sing Greek verse, so that Mopsus had to retire.” 

 

Blanchemain also notes that Ronsard uses this same story in the Franciade, when Francus is setting off to meet Hyante. (I must add, it amuses me that France’s greatest classical playwright, another master of the language, was named after so un-lyrical a bird as the crow… )

 

Blanchemain offers a few stylistic variants but essentially the same poem:

 

 

Ne me suy point, Belleau, allant à la maison

De celle qui me tient en douleur nompareille :

Ignores-tu les vers chantez par la corneille

A Mopse qui suivoit la trace de Jason ?

 

« Prophete, dit l’oiseau, tu n’as point de raison

De suivre cest amant qui tout seul s’appareille

D’aller voir ses amours : peu sage est qui conseille,

Et qui suit un amant quand il n’en est saison. »

 

Pour ton profit, Belleau, je ne veuil que tu voye

Celle qui par les yeux la playe au cœur m’envoye,

De peur que tu ne prenne un mal au mien pareil.

 

Il suffist que sans toy je sois seul miserable :

Reste sain je te pri’ pour estre secourable

A ma douleur extreme, et m’y donner conseil.

 

 

 

 

                                                                            Don’t follow me, Belleau, as I go to the home

                                                                            Of the lady who keeps me in unequalled sadness.

                                                                            Do you not know the song sung by the crow

                                                                            To Mopsus, as he was following Jason’s footsteps ?

 

                                                                            “Prophet,” said the bird, “you are completely wrong

                                                                            To follow this lover who is sailing alone

                                                                            To visit his beloved : ‘little wisdom has he who advises

                                                                            And who follows a lover at the wrong times’.”

 

                                                                            For your profit, Belleau, I do not wish you to see

                                                                            Her who through her eyes sent this wound into my heart,

                                                                            For fear that you may win troubles equal to mine.

 

                                                                            Enough that I alone, and not you, am wretched:

                                                                            Stay healthy, I beg, to be a help

                                                                            In my extreme sadness, and to give me advice.

 

 

 

 

 

Ode 5:3 – a footnote

If you followed my link to the Tombeau de Marguerite de Valois Royne de Navarre, you’ll have noticed that the version of the ode published there was (surprise surprise) rather different! Here, for the completist in you (and me), is the originally-published 1551 version.

 

Aux trois sœurs, Anne, Marguerite et Jane de Seymour, Princesses Angloises, Ode par Pierre de Ronsard Vandomois.

 

Le Conte d’Alsinois [=Denisot] au lecteur :

Amy Lecteur, je t’ay bien voulu faire quelques petites annotations sur les Odes de Ronsard, te promettant continuer a l’avenir sur toutes ses œuvres, affin de te soulagier de peine : j’entens à toi qui n’as encor long temps verse à la lecon des Poëtes. 

 

[‘Dear Reader, I was keen to help you with several small notes on the Odes of Ronsard, promising to continue in future for all his works, to save you trouble; I mean, any of you who have not spent a long time drinking in the learning of our Poets.’  See footnotes below the text.]

 

Quand les filles d’Achelois, La fable Secilienne, Qui foullerent de leurs voix La douceur Hymettienne Virent jaunir la toison, Et les Soudards de Jason Ramer la Barque parlante Pres de leur gyron volante :   Elles d’ordre flanc à flanc, Oisives au front des ondes, D’un peigne d’yvoire blanc Friserent leurs tresses blondes, Et mignotant de leurs yeux Les attraiz delicieux, D’une œillade languissante Guetterent la Nef passante.   Puis souspirerent un chant De leurs gorges nompareilles, Par douce force allechant Les plus gaillardes oreilles, Affin que le son pippeur Fraudast l’honneste labeur Des Heroës de la Grece Amorcéz de leur caresse.   Ja ces Demydieux estoient Prestz de tumber en servage, Et ja dontéz se jettoient Dans la prison du rivage, Sans Orphée, qui soudain Prenant son luc en la main, Opposé contre elles joüe Loing des autres, sur la proüe :   Affin que le contreson De sa repoussante lyre Perdist au vent leur chanson Premier qu’entrer au Navire, Et qu’il tirast du danger Ce jeune peuple estranger, Qui devoit par la Libye Porter sa mere affoiblie.   Mais si le Harpeur fameux Ouyoit le luc des Serenes Qui sonne aux bordz écumeux Sur les Angloises arenes : Son luc payen il fendroit, Et disciple se rendroit Dessous leur chanson Chrestienne Dont la voix passe la sienne.   Car luy enflé de vains motz Devisoit a-l’avanture, Ou des membres du Chaos Ou du sein de la nature ; Mais ces Vierges chantent mieux Le vray Manouvrier des cieux, Nostre demeure eternelle, Et ceulx qui vivent en elle.   Las, ce qu’on voit de mondain Jamais ferme ne se fonde, Ains fuit et refuit soudain Comme le branle d’une onde Qui ne cesse de rouller, De s’avançer et couller, Tant que rampant il arrive D’un grand heurt contre sa rive :   La Science au paravant Si long temps orientale, Peu a peu marchant avant S’apparoist occidentale : Et sans jamais se borner Ell’ n’a cessé de tourner, Tant qu’elle soit parvenue A l’autre rive incognue.   Là, de son grave souci Vint affoller le courage De ces troys Vierges icy, Les trois seules de nostre aage : Et si-bien les sçeut tenter, Qu’ores on les oit chanter Maint vers jumeau qui surmonte Les nostres rouges de honte.   Par vous, Vierges de renom, Vrais peintres de la Memoire, Des aultres vierges le nom Sera cler en vostre gloire. Et puis que le ciel benin Au doux sexe feminin Fait naistre chose si rare D’un lieu jadis tant barbare.   Denisot se vante heuré D’avoir oublyé sa terre Quelquesfois, et demeuré Trois ans en vostre Angleterre, De pres voyant le Soleil Quant il se panche au sommeil Plonger au seing de vostre onde La Lampe de tout le monde.   Voire et d’avoir quelquesfois Tant levé sa petitesse, Que soubz l’outil de sa voix Il pollist vostre hautesse : Vous ouvrant les beaux secretz Des vieux Latins et les Grecz, Dont l’honneur se renouvelle Par vostre Muse nouvelle.   Doncques puis que les espritz D’Angleterre et de la France, Bandéz d’une ligue, ont pris Le fer contre l’Ignorance : Et que nos Roys se sont faictz D’ennemys, amys parfaictz, Tuans la guerre cruelle Par une paix mutuelle.   Avienne qu’une de vous, Noüant la mer passagere, Se joigne à quelqu’un de nous Par une nopce estrangere : Lors voz escriptz avancéz Se voiront recompenséz D’une aultre Ode mieux sonnée, Qui crîra vostre Hymenée.

When the daughters of Achelous, In the Sicilian fable, Who with their voices trampled underfoot The sweetness of Hymettus, Saw the fleece growing golden, And Jason’s soldiers Rowing the talking ship Near their leaping bosom:   Lined up side by side Lazily at the front of the waves, With combs of white ivory They were curling their blonde tresses And, hinting with their eyes At their delicious attractions, With languishing looks Closely watched the passing ship.   Then they sigh a song From their peerless throats, With its sweet force alluring The strongest ears; So that the snaring sound Draws the Greek heroes From their honourable task, Attracted by their caresses.   Now would those half-gods have been Ready to fall into slavery, Now overcome would they have thrown themselves Into the river’s prison, Unless Orpheus, suddenly Taking up his lute in his hand, Opposing them had played Far from the others on the [ship’s] prow,   So that the counter-tune Of his lyre, repelling it, Lost in the wind their song Which first came aboard the ship, And drew away from danger That young tribe of travellers Who needed to take Through Libya their enfeebled mother.   But if the famous harper Heard the lute of the Sirens Which plays on the foamy edges Of the English sands, His pagan lute he would break And would become a disciple Of their Christian song Whose tones surpass his own.   For he, full of empty words, Invented at random Out of the limbs of Chaos Or the heart of Nature; But these maids sing better Of the true maker of the heavens And our eternal home And those who live in it.   Alas, what you see in the world Never rests firm on its foundations, But ebbs and flows suddenly Like the motion of the waves Which never stop rolling, Advancing and falling back, As long as they come crashing With a great shock against its shore.   Knowledge, hitherto For so long a thing of the East, Little by little moving forward Now appeared in the West, And without ever limiting itself Has never stopped changing, So that it arrived At the other shore unknown.   There with its haughty gravity It arrived to bewilder the courage Of these three maids here, The only three of our age, And so well did it tempt them That soon you could hear them singing Many a paired verse which outdid Our own, which blush with shame.   Through you, maidens of renown, True painters of memory, The fame of other maidens Will be bright in your glory. And since benign heaven Made to be born so rare a thing In the sweet feminine sex, And in a place hitherto so barbarous,   Denisot boasts himself happy To have forgotten his own land For some time and remained For three years in your England, Seeing from close by the Sun As it dips towards its rest Plunge into the bosom of your waters the Light of the whole world.   Indeed sometimes [he boasts] of having So raised up his own littleness That with the tool of his own talent He polished up your high style; Opening to you the fair secrets Of the ancient Latins and Greeks, Whose honour is renewed In your new muse.   So, since the spirits Of England and of France, Bound in a league, have taken up Arms against ignorance, And since our kings have become, Instead of enemies, perfect friends Killing cruel war Through a mutual peace,   May it come about that one of you, Swimming the passable sea, Might join herself with some one of us In a foreign marriage; Then your precocious writings Will see themselves rewarded With another Ode better played, Which will announce your wedding.

 

1st stanza:

“les filles d’Achelois”, the Sirens sung by poets in the fables of Sicily

“La douceur Hymettienne”, honey

“la Barque parlante”, Jason’s ship which spoke & predicted the fortunes of the Argonauts in Apollonius

 

3rd stanza:

“Des Heroës de la Grece”, the brave Argonauts

 

5th stanza:

“Qui devoit par la Libye /Porter sa mere affoiblie”, the Argonauts, halted in the Libyan Syrte (desert) were warned in a dream by a certain Nymph, to take their mother, enfeebled by so many ills, through the deserts of Africa to Lake Triton. Their mother was their ship which first bore them in its belly from Thessaly to Colchos. Apollonius book 3.

 

7th stanza:

“Ou des membres du Chaos /Ou du sein de la nature”, Orpheus composed a book of the genealogy of the gods, as he himself bears witness in the first book of the Argonauts

 

12th stanza:

“Denisot se vante heuré …”, the Count of Alsinois, formerly tutor to these three Ladies

“Quant il se panche au sommeil”, this passage must be understood as they say ‘by common sense’ for in truth the sun does not fall (as it seems to fall) into England’s sea; but rather into Spain’s. (Statius: “Cadiz, the bed of the sun”)

 

15th stanza:

“Noüant la mer passagere”, ‘nouant’ (‘swimming’) because he calls them Sirens; ‘passagere’ for ‘passable’, the active for the passive.

 

 

Ode 5:3

The mention of Nicolas Denisot in a recent post sent me off looking for more information. I was fascinated to discover that Ronsard had been one of several Pleiade poets (others were du Bellay and Baif) who contributed poems to a book Denisot saw through the presses in 1551. It was of course early days for the Pleaide poets but it’s still an impressive list! And it secured Denisot’s reputation as a poet.

The book was the Tombeau de Marguerite de Valois Royne de Navarre; you can read it here. But this book was itself a translation (or rather a set of translations) by these French poets of the Hecatodistichon composed by Denisot’s erstwhile pupils in England. For he had spent two or three years there as their tutor before being recalled to France, and their poem in memory of Margaret of Navarre, who died late in 1549 shortly after Denisot’s return to France, no doubt reflected Denisot’s own style and preferences as much as their own. At any rate, Denisot enthusiastically saw the Hecatodistichon through the presses in 1550, and then prevailed on his humanist friends to pull together the Tombeau, whose subtitle is: “Composed first in Latin Distichs by three sisters and Princesses in England; then translated into Greek, Italian and French by several excellent poets of France.” Daurat provided the Greek translation; du Bellay, Denisot and Baif the French; and Jean Pierre de Mesme (who had previously translated Ariosto into French) provided the Italian.

The three princesses were the Seymour sisters – Anne, Margaret and Jane; it’s believed their father hoped to marry Jane to Edward VI, so the family certainly did move in the highest circles. Ronsard’s ode sets their work up as the dawn of culture in England, hitherto ‘barbarous’, and he indicates hopes for an Anglo-French literary rapprochement built on these foundations. Richelet adds notes on the ode (re-published in 1552 in Ronsard’s book 5) to the effect that the ode is “for three learned daughters of England, instructed and taught by Denisot, count of Alsinois”; “because at that time these three ladies had composed a book in Christian distichs, in Latin, terrifically well written, which were soon translated into Greek, Italian and French, and were dedicated to Mme Marguerite, only sister of king Henry II”.

 

Quand les filles d’Achelois, Les trois belles chanteresses, Qui des homme par leurs vois Estoient les enchanteresses, Virent jaunir la toison, Et les soldars de Jason Ramer la barque argienne Sur la mer Sicilienne,   Elles, d’ordre, flanc à flanc, Oisives au front des ondes, D’un peigne d’yvoire blanc Frisotoient leurs tresses blondes, Et mignotant de leurs yeux Les attraits delicieux, Aguignoient la nef passante D’une œillade languissante.   Puis souspirerent un chant De leurs gorges nompareilles, Par douce force alléchant Les plus gaillardes aureilles ; Afin que le son pipeur Fraudast le premier labeur Des chevaliers de la Grece Amorcés de leur caresse.   Ja ces demi-dieux estoient Prests de tomber en servage, Et jà domptés se jettoient Dans la prison du rivage, Sans Orphée, qui, soudain Prenant son luth en la main, Opposé vers elles, joue Loin des autres sur la proue,   Afin que le contre-son De sa repoussante lyre Perdist au vent la chanson Premier qu’entrer au navire, Et qu’il tirast des dangers Ces demi-dieux passagers Qui devoient par la Libye Porter leur mere affoiblie.   Mais si ce harpeur fameux Oyoit le luth des Serenes Qui sonne aux bords escumeux Des Albionnes arenes, Son luth payen il fendroit Et disciple se rendroit Dessous leur chanson chrestienne Dont la voix passe la sienne.   Car luy, enflé de vains mots, Devisoit à l’aventure Ou des membres du Chaos Ou du sein de la Nature ; Mais ces vierges chantent mieux Le vray manouvrier des cieux, Et sa demeure eternelle, Et ceux qui vivent en elle.   Las ! ce qu’on void de mondain Jamais ferme ne se fonde, Ains fuit et refuit soudain Comme le branle d’une onde Qui ne cesse de rouler, De s’avancer et couler, Tant que rampant il arrive D’un grand heurt contre la rive.   La science, auparavant Si long temps orientale, Peu à peu marchant avant, S’apparoist occidentale, Et sans jamais se borner N’a point cessé de tourner, Tant qu’elle soit parvenue A l’autre rive incogneue.   Là de son grave sourcy Vint affoler le courage De ces trois vierges icy, Les trois seules de nostre âge, Et si bien les sceut tenter, Qu’ores on les oit chanter Maint vers jumeau qui surmonte Les nostres, rouges de honte.   Par vous, vierges de renom, Vrais peintres de la mémoire, Des autres vierges le nom Sera clair en vostre gloire. Et puis que le ciel benin Au doux sexe feminin Fait naistre chose si rare D’un lieu jadis tant barbare,   Denisot se vante heuré D’avoir oublié sa terre, Et passager demeuré Trois ans en vostre Angleterre, Et d’avoir cogneu vos yeux, Où les amours gracieux Doucement leurs fleches dardent Contre ceux qui vous regardent.   Voire et d’avoir quelquefois Tant levé sa petitesse, Que sous l’outil de sa vois Il polit vostre jeunesse, Vous ouvrant les beaux secrets Des vieux Latins et les Grecs, Dont l’honneur se renouvelle Par vostre muse nouvelle.   Io, puis que les esprits D’Angleterre et de la France, Bandez d’un ligue, ont pris Le fer contre l’ignorance, Et que nos roys se sont faits D’ennemis amis parfaits, Tuans la guerre cruelle Par une paix mutuelle,   Advienne qu’une de vous, Nouant la mer passagere, Se joigne à quelqu’un de nous Par une nopce estrangere ; Lors vos escrits avancez Se verront recompensez D’une chanson mieux sonnée, Qui cri’ra vostre hymenée.

When the daughters of Achelous, The three fair singers Who were with their voices Enchantresses of men, Saw the fleece growing golden, And Jason’s soldiers Rowing the ship, the Argo, On the Sicilian sea,   Lined up side by side Lazily at the front of the waves, With combs of white ivory They were curling their blonde tresses And, hinting with their eyes At their delicious attractions, Making signs to the passing ship With a languishing look.   Then they sigh a song From their peerless throats, With its sweet force alluring The strongest ears; So that the snaring sound Draws the Greek knights From their primary task, Attracted by their caresses.   Now would those half-gods have been Ready to fall into slavery, Now overcome would they have thrown themselves Into the river’s prison, Unless Orpheus, suddenly Taking up his lute in his hand, Opposing the ladies had played Far from the others on the [ship’s] prow,   So that the counter-tune Of his lyre, repelling it, Lost in the wind the song Which first came aboard the ship, And drew away from danger Those half-god travellers Who needed to take Through Libya their enfeebled mother.   But if that famous harper Heard the lute of the Sirens Which plays on the foamy edges Of Albion’s sands, His pagan lute he would break And would become a disciple Of their Christian song Whose tones surpass his own.   For he, full of empty words, Invented at random Out of the limbs of Chaos Or the heart of Nature; But these maids sing better Of the true maker of the heavens And his eternal home And those who live in it.   Alas, what you see in the world Never rests firm on its foundations, But ebbs and flows suddenly Like the motion of the waves Which never stop rolling, Advancing and falling back, As long as they come crashing With a great shock against the shore.   Knowledge, hitherto For so long a thing of the East, Little by little moving forward Now appeared in the West, And without ever limiting itself Never stopped changing, So that it arrived At the other shore unknown.   There with its haughty gravity It arrived to bewilder the courage Of these three maids here, The only three of our age, And so well did it tempt them That soon you could hear them singing Many a paired verse which outdid Our own, which blush with shame.   Through you, maidens of renown, True painters of memory, The fame of other maidens Will be bright in your glory. And since benign heaven Made to be born so rare a thing In the sweet feminine sex, And in a place hitherto so barbarous,   Denisot boasts himself happy To have forgotten his own land And remained a traveller For three years in your England, And to have known your eyes From which gracious cupids Softly dart their arrows Against those who look on you.   Indeed sometimes [he boasts] of having So raised up his own littleness That with the tool of his own talent He polished up your youthfulness, Opening to you the fair secrets Of the ancient Latins and Greeks, Whose honour is renewed In your new muse.   Ah, since the spirits Of England and of France, Bound in a league, have taken up Arms against ignorance, And since our kings have become, Instead of enemies, perfect friends Killing cruel war Through a mutual peace,   May it come about that one of you, Swimming the passage of the sea, Might join herself with some one of us In a foreign marriage; Then your precocious writings Will see themselves rewarded With a song better played, Which will announce your wedding.

(Let me admit that the second line of that last stanza is a bit of a paraphrase! “Nouer” was an antique word even in Ronsard’s day, equivalent to “nager” (‘to swim’).)

The poem falls into three equal sections: the classical introduction, the generalities about the awakening of culture in England; and then the specific praise of the three ladies. In the classical opening, Achelous was the chief river-deity of classical myth and father of the Sirens.  The legend of Jason and the Argonauts, in search of the Golden Fleece, is well-known, though it’s usually the meeting of Odysseus and the Sirens we read; less well-known is that Orpheus was one of the Argonauts.

 

 

 

Sonnet 15

Ha, qu’à bon droit les Charites d’Homere

Un faict soudain comparent au penser,

Qui parmi l’air peut de loin devancer

Le Chevalier qui tua la Chimere :

 

Si tost que luy une nef passagere

De mer en mer ne pourroit s’élancer,

Ny par les champs ne le sçauroit lasser,

Du faux et vray la prompte messagere.

 

Le vent Borée ignorant le repos,

Conceut le mien de nature dispos,

Qui dans le Ciel et par la mer encore

 

Et sur les champs animé de vigueur,

Comme un Zethés, s’envole apres mon cueur,

Qu’un Harpye en se jouant devore.

 

 

 

                                                                       Ah, how rightly the Graces of Homer

                                                                       Would compare a sudden deed to thought

                                                                       Which can far outrun through the air

                                                                       That Knight who killed the Chimaera :

 

                                                                       So quick, that a ship in its passage

                                                                       From sea to sea could not forge ahead of it

                                                                       Nor over land could the swift messenger

                                                                       Of truth and falsehood outrun it.

 

                                                                       The North Wind which never rests

                                                                       Conceived my [thoughts], by nature alert,

                                                                       Which in the heavens and by sea too

 

                                                                       And over land, vigorous and active

                                                                       Like Zetes, fly off after my heart

                                                                       Which a Harpy is playfully devouring.

 

 

Another of those complicated classical allusions which struggles to come to life. Homer does indeed compare swift deeds to the speed of thought; the Knight is Bellerophon whose flight on Pegasus to defeat the Chimaera is here recalled; the ‘swift messenger of truth and falsehood’ is Rumour, subject of a famous passge in Virgil’s Aeneid; Zetes is one of the sons of the North Wind; and the Harpies were the winged demons who came and stole all the food from Phineus’s table in the story of Jason and the Argonauts – – as featured in the Ray Harryhausen epic film !