Helen ‘non encor imprimez’ 1

 

Maistresse, embrasse-moy, baise-moy, serre-moy

Haleine contre haleine, échauffe moy la vie,

Mille et mille baizers donne moy je te prie,

Amour veut tout sans nombre, amour n’a point de loy.

 

Baize et rebaize moy; belle bouche pourquoy

Te gardes tu là bas, quand tu seras blesmie,

A baiser (de Pluton ou la femme ou l’amie),

N’ayant plus ny couleur, ny rien semblable à toy?

 

En vivant presse moy de tes levres de roses,

Begaye, en me baisant, à levres demy-closes

Mille mots trançonnez, mourant entre mes bras.

 

Je mourray dans les tiens, puis, toy resuscitee,

Je resusciteray, allons ainsi là bas,

Le jour tant soit il court vaut mieux que la nuitee.

 

 

 

                                                                           Mistress, embrace me, kiss me, hold me

                                                                           Breath against breath, warm up my life,

                                                                           Thousands and thousands of kisses give me, I beg;

                                                                           Love wants them all, numberless kisses: Love has no law.

 

                                                                           Kiss and re-kiss me! Fair mouth, why

                                                                           Are you keeping yourself for kissing down below,

                                                                           When you’ll be pale, the wife or girlfriend of Pluto,

                                                                           No longer having colour or anything else which is like yourself?

 

                                                                           While you’re alive, press on me your rosy lips,

                                                                           Stammer as you kiss me with half-closed lips

                                                                           A thousand chopped-up words, as you die in my arms.

 

                                                                           I shall die in yours, then when you are revived

                                                                           I shall revive. Let’s go together down below:

                                                                           The day, however short it is, is worth more than the night-time.

 

 

 

 

 

Collected together after Ronsard’s death were a number of “Sonnets du feu P. de Ronsard, pour Heleine de Surgeres, non encor imprimez” (‘Sonnets of the late P. de Ronsard for Helen de Surgeres, not printed before’). Blanchemain printed 9, Marty-Laveaux appears to have 15 – though several certainly were ‘encor imprimez’ as they had appeared among the ‘Sonnets for Astrée’!

 

The quality is, as with many of the poems which Ronsard withdrew from his other books of Amours, generally hard to separate from that of the other poems which did get printed! Here, I think he may have kept it back only because the theme is one he had used elsewhere – though (as often) the detail is different: I don’t recall another one in which he marries Helen (or another lover) to Pluto! Another reason might be that the ending has something of the feel of a random collection of thoughts, rather than tying the poem up neatly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Odes 4:5

 

Guy, nos meilleurs ans coulent Comme les eaux qui roulent D’un cours sempiternel ; La mort pour sa sequelle Nous ameine avec elle Un exil éternel.   Nulle humaine priere Ne repousse en arriere Le bateau de Charon, Quand l’ame nue arrive Vagabonde en la rive De Styx et d’Acheron.   Toutes choses mondaines Qui vestent nerfs et veines La mort égale prend, Soient pauvres ou soient princes ; Car sur toutes provinces Sa main large s’estend.   La puissance tant forte Du grand Achille est morte, Et Thersite, odieux Aux Grecs, est mort encores ; Et Minos qui est ores Le conseiller des dieux.   Jupiter ne demande Que des bœufs pour offrande ; Mais son frere Pluton Nous demande, nous hommes, Qui la victime sommes De son enfer glouton.   Celuy dont le Pau baigne Le tombeau nous enseigne N’esperer rien de haut, Et celuy que Pegase (Qui fit soucer Parnase) Culbuta d’un grand saut.   Las ! on ne peut cognaistre Le destin qui doit naistre, Et l’homme en vain poursuit Conjecturer la chose Que Dieu sage tient close Sous une obscure nuit.   Je pensois que la trope Que guide Calliope, Troupe mon seul confort, Soustiendroit ma querelle, Et qu’indonté par elle Je donterois la mort.   Mais une fiévre grosse Creuse déjà ma fosse Pour me banir là bas, Et sa flame cruelle Se paist de ma mouelle, Miserable repas.   Que peu s’en faut, ma vie, Que tu ne m’es ravie Close sous le tombeau, Et que mort je ne voye Où Mercure convoye Le debile troupeau !   [Et ce Grec qui les peines Dont les guerres sont pleines Va là bas racontant, Poëte qu’une presse Des épaules espaisse Admire en l’écoutant.]   A bon droit Prométhée Pour sa fraude inventée Endure un tourment tel, Qu’un aigle sur la roche Luy ronge d’un bec croche Son poumon immortel.   Depuis qu’il eut robée La flame prohibée, Pour les dieux despiter, Les bandes incogneues Des fiévres sont venues Parmi nous habiter.   Et la mort despiteuse, Auparavant boiteuse, Fut légère d’aller ; D’ailes mal-ordonnées Aux hommes non données Dedale coupa l’air.   L’exécrable Pandore Fut forgée, et encore Astrée s’en-vola, Et la boîte féconde Peupla le pauvre monde De tant de maux qu’il a.   Ah ! le meschant courage Des hommes de nostre âge N’endure pas ses faits ; Que Jupiter estuye Sa foudre, qui s’ennuye Venger tant de mesfaits !

Guy, our best years rush by Like streams flowing In their everlasting race ; Death, as the sequel, Brings us with it Eternal exile.   No human prayer Can push back Charon’s boat When the naked soul arrives A wanderer at the river Styx and Acheron.   All wordly things Equipped with nerves and veins Death takes equally, Be they poor men or princes ; For over all the empires Its wide hand extends.   The strength, though great, Of mighty Achilles is dead ; And Thersites, hated By the Greeks, is dead too ; And Minos too, who was once Advisor to the gods.   Jupiter requires only Cattle as an offering ; But his brother Pluto Requires us, us men, Who are the victims Of his greedy hell.   He, whose tomb the Pau [Po] Bathes, teaches us To hope for nothing from on high, And he too, whom Pegasus (Who disquieted Parnassus) Knocked down with his great leap.   Alas ! we cannot know The fate which must come to us, And man in vain seeks To conjecture what thing Our wise God keeps hidden Beneath dark night.   I thought that the troop Whom Calliope leads, The troop which is my sole comfort, Would support my complaint And that, untamed by them, I would tame death.   But a great fever Is already digging my grave To banish me down there, And its cruel flame Is feeding on my marrow, A wretched repast.   How little is needed, mt life, For you to be taken from me, Shut in beneath my tomb, And for me to see death Where Mercury brings The feeble troop !   [And that Greek who Continually recounts down there The pains with which war is filled, The poet whom a crowd Of wide shoulders Admires as they listen.]   Rightly does Prometheus For that trick he contrived Endure such torment, As, on his rock, an eagle With its crooked beak gnaws His immortal guts.   Since he stole away The forbidden fire To spite the gods, The unknown bonds Of fevers have come To live among us ;   And resentful death, Before that limping slowly, Has become light on his feet. With clumsy wings Not granted to man Daedalus cut through the air.   Cursed Pandora Was forged and, still A star, flew off While the fruitful box Peopled this poor world With all the evils it had.   Ah, the paltry courage Of the men of our age Cannot endure their deeds ; May Jupiter hold back His thunderbolts, bored with Avenging so many misdeeds !

 

This Ode is dedicated to Guy Pacate, prior of Sougé – a small village in the Loir region. Even today it consists of little more than one street and a church. Pacate had been one of the little group around Daurat in the 1540s, including Ronsard, du Bellay and Denisot, from which sprang the Pléiade. Among them he was apparently known for his learning and his gift for Latin poetry; though beyond their circle he seems obscure.  Perhaps it is relevant that, in the posthumous editions of Ronsard the dedication was to Jean Daurat himself, rather than this little-known satellite of his.

 

It’s certainly relevant that Pacate knew his classics: there is an array of classical references here rarely seen in such number in Ronsard’s poems! But at the same time Ronsard contrives an inward-looking reflection on death rather than a grand, public poem, suitable to the relative obscurity of the dedicatee.

 

Stanza 2 refers to the journey to the afterlife: souls would come down to the river Styx where they awaited Charon’s boat to ferry them over to Hades. (Mercury guided souls to the underworld – stanza 10.)

 

Stanza 4 contrasts Achilles with Thersites, the former the hero of the Iliad, the latter an annoying, cowardly tell-tale also on the Greek side; and adds Minos, once a king on earth, but tricked and killed in his bath by his daughters.

 

In stanza 6, Pau is famous as the birthplace of “noste Enric” (‘our Henry’), Henry IV of France; and earlier was the base of Gaston Fébus, whose Renaissance court paralleled that of Italian city-states. But this Pau is in fact the Po in north Italy, reputed to be where Phaethon fell when struck down by Jupiter’s thunderbolt. The second half of the stanza is about Perseus; other editions have “sourcer” rather than the (unique?) “soucer” which I have treated as if it were “soucier”: “Qui fit sourcer Parnase” would mean something like “who made a spring come from Parnassus”, the spring being the Hippocrene spring which was created when Pegasus stamped his foot, and which became sacred to the Muses.

 

The troop of Calliope in stanza 8 is the Muses – Calliope is the muse of epic poetry. In stanza 11, the poet is no doubt Homer; we have met Prometheus (stanzas 12-13), punished by the gods for bringing fire to man, regularly. In stanza 14 I have to admit the presence of Daedalus confuses me: there is no link to Pandora, nor did his flight lead to his own death. I assume that Ronsard is offering a simile – like Daedalus taking wing, death too became swifter.

 

Finally, in the penultimate stanza, Pandora is ‘forged’ because she the first woman, was made by Vulcan on Jupiter’s instructions. The story of the evils contained in Pandora’s box is well-known.

 

 

 

 

 

Sonnets diverses 1 – to King Henri II

Au Roy Henry II de ce nom    (To King Henry, second of that name)

 

Je vous donne le Ciel pour vos estrenes, SIRE.

Je ferois à la France, et à vous un grand tort,

A vous, sain et dispos, jeune, gaillard et fort ;

A la France qui seul pour son Roy vous desire ;

 

De vous donner la Mer : que vous vaudroit l’Empire

Des vagues et des vents ? De vous donner le sort

Qui survint à Pluton, que vous vaudroit le port

De l’Enfer odieux, des trois Mondes le pire ?

 

La France vous suffit, vous estes estrené :

Vos fils puisnez sont Ducs, Roy vostre fils aisné :

Et vos filles bien tost vous feront le grand-père

 

D’enfans, qui porteront le Sceptre en divers lieux,

Ainsi doresnavant vous serez dit le Père

Des Rois dont la grandeur vaut bien celle des Dieux

 

 

 

 

                                                                            If I give you the heavens as your new-year’s gift, Sire,

                                                                            I would do France and you a great wrong:

                                                                            You, as you are healthy and fit, young, merry and strong;

                                                                            France, as it wants you alone for its King.

 

                                                                            If I gave you the sea, what use to you would be the rule

                                                                            Of its waves and winds? If I gave you the lot

                                                                            Which fell to Pluto, what use to you would be the harbour

                                                                            Of hateful Hell, the worst of the three worlds?

 

                                                                            France is enough for you; there, that is your gift:

                                                                            Your younger children are Dukes, your eldest a King;

                                                                            And your daughters will soon make you the grandfather

 

                                                                            Of children who will bear the Sceptre in various places;

                                                                            And hereafter you will be called the Father

                                                                            Of Kings, whose greatness is like that of the gods.

 

 

A couple of notes:  Pluto was alloted Hades, while Jupiter got the heavens and Neptune the seas to rule.  Ronsard alludes to all three in the opening stanzas. In line 10, the ‘eldest child’ is Francis, later Francis II of France briefly, who at the time was King Consort of Scotland through his marriage to Mary, Queen of Scots (there is a beautiful double-portrait in Catherine de Medici’s book of hours.) . His death at the end of 1560 left her (briefly Queen Consort of France) a widow still in her teens, and free to pursue the chaotic course of her Scottish career with Darnley and Bothwell.

 

There is one small but significant difference in Blanchemain’s version, at the very beginning:  “De vous donner le ciel …”. He obviously changed it to avoid beginning the 2 quatrains with the same words. But the change was not a great one otherwise: while the original opening (“De vous donner le ciel …”) clearly means ‘If I gave you the heavens…’, I have been a little naughty in translating the revised version (“Je vous donne…”) the same way. In fact, it seems to me that grammatically the new version should be saying something like:  ‘I give you the heavens, Sire. I would be doing you & France wrong to give you the sea.’ But that upsets the balance of the quatrains as well as making lines 5-6 mostly repetition. So I think we have to read Ronsard’s new version as saying ‘I give you the heavens. (But no – ) I would be doing you & France a great wrong…”

 

I have put this in the Sonnets diverses – which is where Blanchemain prints it – though Marty-Laveaux includes it among the various “sonnets retranchées” in his final volume.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

« La Trophée d’Amour » (from Mascarades)

« La Trophée d’Amour », the Trophy (or monument) of Love, is dedicated “à la Comedie de Fontaine-bleau” (‘to the Comedy [Theatre] at Fontainebleau’). It’s a light-hearted portrait of Cupid.

 

Je suis Amour le grand maistre des Dieux, Je suis celuy qui fait mouvoir les Cieux, Je suis celuy qui gouverne le monde, Qui le premier hors de la masse esclos Donnay lumiere et fendis le Chaos Dont fut basti ceste machine ronde.   Rien ne sçauroit à mon arc resister, Rien ne pourroit mes fleches eviter, Et enfant nud je fais toujours la guerre : Tout m’obeyst, les oiseaux esmaillez, Et de la mer les poissons escaillez, Et les mortels heritiers sur la terre.   La paix, la tréve, et la guerre me plaist, Du sang humain mon appetit se paist, Et volontiers je m’abreuve de larmes : Les plus hautains sont pris à mon lien, Le corselet au soldart ne sert rien Et le harnois ne defend les gend’armes.   Je tourne et change et renverse et desfais Ce que je veux, et puis je le refais, Et de mon feu toute ame est eschaufée : Je suis de tous le Seigneur et le Roy : Rois et Seigneurs vont captifs devant moy, Et de leurs cœurs j’enrichis mon trofée.   De Jupiter le Sçeptre j’ay donté, Jusqu’aux enfers j’ai Pluton surmonté, Et de Neptune ay blessé la poitrine : De rien ne sert aux ondes la froideur, Que les Tritons ne sentent mon ardeur, Et que mon feu n’embrase la marine.   La Volupté, la Jeunesse me suit, L’oisiveté en pompe me conduit, Je suis aveugle, et si ay bonne veuë, Je suis enfant et suis pere des Dieux, Foible, puissant, superbe, gracieux, Et sans viser je frappe à l’imporveüe.   L’homme est de plomb, de rocher et de bois Qui n’a senti les traits de mon carquois : Seul je le fais et courtois et adestre : Les cœurs sans moi languissent refroidis, Je les rends chauds, animez et hardis, Et bref je suis de toute chose maistre.   Qui ne me voit, au monde ne voit rien : Je suis du mondeet le mal et le bien, Je suis le doux et l’amer tout ensemble, Je n’ay patron ny exemple que moy, Je suis mon tout, ma puissance et ma loy, Et seulement à moi seul je ressemble.

I am Love, great master of the gods, I am he who makes the heavens move, I am he who rules the world, Who first, blossoming from the masses, Gave light and split Chaos apart, By whom this round engine [the world] was built.   None can resist my bow, None can avoid my arrows, And always as a naked child I make war; Everyone obeys me – the glittering birds, The scaly fish in the sea, And the mortals who’ve inherited the earth.   Peace, truce and war please me, With human blood is my appetite satisfied, And I happily drink my fill of tears; The haughtiest are caught in my bonds, A breastplate is no use to the soldier Nor can armour defend the man-at-arms.   I twist and change, reverse and undo Whatever I want, and then re-do it; With my fire every soul is warmed. I am the lord and king of all men, Kings and lords go captive before me And with their hearts I enrich my monument.   I have subdued Jupiter’s sceptre, I’ve overcome Pluto in Hades, I’ve wounded Neptune’s breast, The cold of the waves is no use To keep the Tritons from feeling my warmth, And my fire from burning the sea.   Pleasure and Youth follow me; Idleness escorts me in procession; I am blind yet I see well, I am a child yet I am the father of the gods, Weak and powerful, proud and gracious, Without aiming I strike unexpectedly   The man is made of lead, stone, or wood Who has not felt wounds from my quiver, I alone make them, both courteous and skilful; Without me, hearts languish, frozen; I make them hot, excited and bold, And in brief I am master of all.   He who cannot see me in the world, sees nothing; I am the good and bad in the world, The sweet and the bitter together; I have no boss, no example but myself; I am all I need, my own power and my own law, And I resemble only myself.

 

Minor variants only in Blanchemain:  at the end of the fourth stanza, he has

 

 

Je suis de tout le Seigneur et le Roy :

Rois et Seigneurs vont captifs devant moy,

Et de leurs cœurs je bastis mon trofée.

 

                                                                                           I am the lord and king of all things,

                                                                                           Kings and lords go captive before me

                                                                                           And from their hearts I build my monument.

 

and a couple of stanzas from the end he has the line “Foible et puissant, superbe et gracieux”, which has a subtly different weight.

 

 

Sonnet 135

Sonnet 134 is already on the blog (here); so here’s no.135.

Douce beauté, meurdriere de ma vie,

En lieu d’un cœur tu portes un rocher :

Tu me fais vif languir et desecher

Passionné d’une amoureuse envie.

 

Le jeune sang qui d’aimer te convie,

N’a peu de toy la froideur arracher,

Farouche fiere, et qui n’as rien plus cher

Que languir froide, et n’estre point servie.

 

Appren à vivre, ô fiere en cruauté :

Ne garde point à Pluton ta beauté,

Quelque peu d’aise en aimant il faut prendre.

 

Il faut tromper doucement le trespas :

Car aussi bien sous la terre là-bas

Sans rien sentir le corps n’est plus que cendre.

 

 

 

 

                                                                            Sweet beauty, murderer of my life,

                                                                            In place of a heart you have a stone;

                                                                            You make me, though alive, fade away and shrivel up

                                                                            Impassioned with love’s desire.

 

                                                                            The youthful blood which urges you to love

                                                                            Has not been able to draw off your coldness from you,

                                                                            Wild and proud one, who hold nothing dearer

                                                                            Than sitting listlessly and coldly, accepting no service.

 

                                                                            Learn to live, proud in your cruelty;

                                                                            Don’t keep your beauty for Pluto,

                                                                            But take a little enjoyment from love.

 

                                                                            We must sweetly distract ourselves from death,

                                                                            For indeed, down there below the earth,

                                                                            Feeling nothing, our bodies are only dust.

(Translation amended – see Nathan’s comment below, which also explains the use of “aussi bien” in the penultimate line – a phrase which had troubled me.) Nathan explains the use of ‘tromper’. I feel line 12 would be better translated – or rather paraphrased – as “Let’s sweetly distract…” — but in the spirit of trying to represent the words Ronsard uses rather than to modify his phraseoogy I’ve stuck with ‘we must’.  I have of course allowed myself, nevertheless, to make the verb reflexive – in French one ‘distracts death’, but the meaning is that one distracts oneself from death. 

 

This is one of those poems in which Ronsard tweaked the sestet to try to get closer to his ideal. Personally I feel his first version was better and the later one (above) more obscure. Here’s that earlier, clearer version from Blanchemain (note that he didn’t modify “aussi bien” between versions!):

 

 

Apprens à vivre, ô fiere en cruauté ;

Ne garde point à Pluton ta beauté ;

Tes passetemps en aimant il faut prendre.

 

Le seul plaisir peut tromper le trespas :

Car, aussi bien, quand nous serons là-bas,

Sans plus aimer, nous ne serons que cendre. 

 

 

                                                                            Learn to live, proud in your cruelty;

                                                                            Don’t keep your beauty for Pluto;

                                                                            You must spend your leisure in love.

 

                                                                            Only pleasure can distract us from death,

                                                                            For, indeed, when we are down below

                                                                            With no more love, we will be only dust.

(The next poem in the book is the “Stances” (stanzas) – the first poem not in sonnet form in the book.  It is already on the blog (here), along with the two following sonnets nos. 136 and 137.  So the next entry will be no. 138.)

 

 

 

To Robert Garnier (3)

Quel son masle et hardy, quelle bouche héroique,

Et quel superbe vers enten-je icy sonner ?

Le lierre est trop bas pour ton front couronner,

Et le bouc est trop peu pour ta Muse tragique.

 

Si Bacchus retournoit au manoir Plutonique,

Il ne voudroit Eschyle au monde redonner,

Il te choisiroit seul, qui seul peux estonner

Le theatre François de ton cothurne antique.

 

Les premiers trahissoient l’infortune des Rois,

Redoublant leur malheur d’une trop basse voix :

La tienne comme foudre en la France s’écarte.

 

Heureux en bons esprits ce siecle plantureux :

Auprés toy, mon Garnier, je me sens bien-heureux,

De quoy mon petit Loir est voisin de ta Sarte.

 

 

 

 

                                                                            What sound, manly and bold, what heroic voice,

                                                                            And what proud verse do I hear ringing out here?

                                                                            The ivy is too poor to crown your brow,

                                                                            And the ram too little for your tragic Muse.

 

                                                                            If Bacchus returned to Pluto’s domain

                                                                            He would not want to give Aeschylus back to the world,

                                                                            He would choose only you, who alone can astonish

                                                                            French theatre with your antique buskin.

 

                                                                            Earlier writers betrayed the misfortune of kings,

                                                                            Redoubling their misfortunes with too poor a voice:

                                                                            Yours, like thunder, rolls forth across France.

 

                                                                            Blessed with great spirits is this bounteous age;

                                                                            Beside you, my Garnier, I feel myself fortunate

                                                                            That my little Loir neighbours your Sarte.

 

 

 

As with the previous poem, Ronsard writes here in his usual Alexandrines. They seem appropriate for a poem proclaiming the voice of thunder with which Garnier speaks, and for comparing him with Aeschylus, perhaps the most noble and high-flown of the three great Greek tragedians and the most natural compaarator (in my view) for the French grand style. (By contrast, Shakespeare is comfortable in Sophoclean or Euripidean style, though he can rise to Aeschylean heights when he wants to:  French tragedy cannot descend to the commonplace of Euripides, and rarely to the middle ground of Sophocles!)  Incidentally this is the first time one of the ancient Greek tragedians has been mentioned in a poem (as opposed to a footnote) on this blog.

 

Having said which, it is pretty obvious that the compliment is over-blown… and Ronsard’s self-deprecation in the final line doesn’t of course stop him making sure we know exactly who has written this encomium!  I imagine Ronsard with his tongue in his cheek; and I have to say I like his style here!

 

In the first stanza the ivy wreath or laurel wreath is an ancient tragic prize; the ram is a sacrifice appropriate to the gods of ancient Greece, but as Ronsard says here too small to say thank you for so great a talent as Garnier…

 

 

 

 

Sonnet 44 (Marie)

For no particular reason other than I was reading something other than Helen, here’s a beautiful sonnet from the Marie set:

 

Marie, baisez-moy : non, ne me baisez pas,

Mais tirez moy le cœur de vostre douce haleine :

Non, ne le tirez pas, mais hors de chaque veine

Succez-moy toute l’ame esparse entre vos bras :

 

Non, ne la succez pas : car apres le trespas

Que serois-je sinon une semblance vaine,

Sans corps desur la rive, où l’amour ne demeine

(Pardonne moy Pluton) qu’en feintes ses esbas ?

 

Pendant que nous vivons, entr’aimons nous, Marie,

Amour ne regne point sur la troupe blesmie

Des morts, qui sont sillez d’un long somme de fer.

 

C’est abus que Pluton ait aimé Proserpine,

Si doux soing n’entre point en si dure poitrine :

Amour regne en la terre et non point en enfer.

 

 

 

 

                                                                                Marie, kiss me ; no, don’t kiss me

                                                                                But draw out my heart with your sweet breath;

                                                                                No, don’t draw it out, but from each vein

                                                                                Suck out my whole soul, spread within your arms;

 

                                                                                No, don’t suck it out; for after my death

                                                                                What would I be but an empty shade

                                                                                With no body, upon the river where love dances

                                                                                (Pardon me, Pluto) its frolics only in sham.

 

                                                                                While we live, let us love one another, Marie,

                                                                                Love does not reign at all over the pallid company

                                                                                Of the dead, who are buried in a long, iron-hard sleep.

 

                                                                                It’s a lie that Pluto loved Proserpina;

                                                                                So sweet a care never entered so harsh a breast;

                                                                                Love reigns with the ladies, never in Hades.

 

 

 

Ronsard’s friend Remy Belleau, in his edition of Ronsard’s Marie (quoted by Blanchemain), said “this sonnet is among the most beautiful to be found, for being full of noble, contrary repetitions”.  The last line I have translated freely: literally it should be something like ‘Love reigns in the world, never in the underworld’, to try (clumsily) to catch that internal half-rhyme on ‘terre/enfer’. But I read that as rather a sly, tongue in cheek, half-rhyme, which is why I’ve gone with a less accurate but livelier rhyme in my text 🙂 

 

The story of Pluto running away with Proserpina (Persephone), the daughetr of Ceres, is a well-known legend, a trope for the changing seasons: Persephone returns to her mother in Spring, the corn (Ceres) happily re-grows, and then in autumn Pluto takes Persephone back under the ground while winter hardens the ground and nothing grows. It is perhaps strange that Ronsard should be so rude to Pluto in the last tercet, after begging his pardon a few lines earlier. Once again, late tinkering is to blame, for in the earlier version (below) there is no begging of pardon.

 

Naturally Blanchemain’s text has some other minor changes too, perhaps most surprisingly (given this is in the middle of the Amours de Marie), in addressing the poem to Sinope not Marie! Mythologically, Sinope is a minor legendary figure, ancestor of the race of the Syrians; but in Ronsard she is an older, fading beauty to whom he addresses a short cycle of sonnets.

 

As the changes in Blanchemain’s version are scattered through the text it will do least violence to your enjoyment of the poem if I print it in full in his version:

 

 

Sinope, baisez-moy : non, ne me baisez pas,

Mais tirez moy le cœur de vostre douce haleine :

Non, ne le tirez pas, mais hors de chaque veine

Succez-moy toute l’ame esparse entre vos bras :

 

Non, ne la succez pas : car apres le trespas

Que serois-je sinon une semblance vaine,

Sans corps desur la rive, où l’amour ne demeine

Comme il fait icy haut, qu’en feintes ses esbas ?

 

Pendant que nous vivons, entr’aimons nous, Sinope ;

Amour ne regne point sur la debile trope

Des morts, qui sont sillez d’un long somme de fer.

 

C’est abus que Pluton ait aimé Proserpine,

Si doux soing n’entre point en si dure poitrine :

Amour regne en la terre et non point en enfer.

 

 

                                                                               Sinope, kiss me ; no, don’t kiss me

                                                                               But draw out my heart with your sweet breath;

                                                                               No, don’t draw it out, but from each vein

                                                                               Suck out my whole soul, spread within your arms;

 

                                                                               No, don’t suck it out; for after my death

                                                                               What would I be but an empty shade

                                                                               With no body, upon the river where love dances,

                                                                               As it doesn’t up here, its frolics only in sham.

 

                                                                               While we live, let us love one another, Sinope,

                                                                               Love does not reign at all over the feeble company

                                                                               Of the dead, who are buried in a long, iron-hard sleep.

 

                                                                               It’s a lie that Pluto loved Proserpina;

                                                                               So sweet a care never entered so harsh a breast;

                                                                               Love reigns with the ladies, never in Hades.

 

 

 

 [ PS  I’m sure that Ronsard had a wry smile on his face as he re-wrote the opening of line 8 to echo the beginning of this poem in his Cassandre set. The echo is entirely deliberate, I am certain. ]

 

 

 

 

Stances (Stanzas) – 135a

In book 1, also, Ronsard inserts occasional lyrics which do not conform to sonnet form. This one is a lovely frisky light-hearted one!

Quand au temple nous serons Agenouillez, nous ferons Les devots selon la guise De ceux qui pour loüer Dieu Humbles se courbent au lieu Le plus secret de l’Eglise.   Mais quand au lict nous serons Entrelassez, nous ferons Les lascifs selon les guises Des Amans qui librement Pratiquent folastrement Dans les draps cent mignardises.   Pourquoy donque quand je veux Ou mordre tes beaux cheveux, Ou baiser ta bouche aimee, Ou toucher à ton beau sein, Contrefais-tu la nonnain Dedans un cloistre enfermee ?   Pour qui gardes-tu tes yeux Et ton sein delicieux, Ton front, ta lèvre jumelle ? En veux-tu baiser Pluton Là bas, apres que Charon T’aura mise en sa nacelle ?   Apres ton dernier trespas, Gresle, tu n’auras là bas Qu’une bouchette blesmie : Et quand mort je te verrois Aux Ombres je n’avou’rois Que jadis tu fus m’amie.   Ton test n’aura plus de peau, Ny ton visage si beau N’aura veines ny arteres : Tu n’auras plus que les dents Telles qu’on les voit dedans Les testes des cimeteres.   Donque tandis que tu vis, Change, Maistresse, d’avis, Et ne m’espargne ta bouche : Incontinent tu mourras, Lors tu te repentiras De m’avoir esté farouche.   Ah je meurs !  Ah baise moy ! Ah, Maistresse, approche toy ! Tu fuis comme un Fan qui tremble : Au-moins souffre que ma main S’esbate un peu dans ton sein, Ou plus bas, si bon te semble.

When we are in the temple [church] Kneeling, we will look like The devout, the very image Of those who, to worship God, Humbly bow towards the Most holy part of the church.   But when we are in bed Entwined, we will look like The lascivious, the very image Of lovers who freely And friskily perform A hundred little acts of love under the sheets.   So why, when I want To bite your lovely hair Or to kiss your beloved lips Or to brush against your lovely breast, Do you pretend to be a little nun In an enclosed convent?   For whom are you keeping your eyes And your delicious breast, Your brow, your twin lips? Do you want to kiss Pluto with them Down below, after Charon Has taken you into his little boat?   After your eventual death, Down there you’ll be spindly, with nothing But a deathly-pale mouth; And when I’m dead and see you In the Shades I will not recognise That you were formerly my beloved.   Your head will no longer have skin on it Your face – oh so beautiful ! – Won’t have its veins and arteries; You will just have teeth left, Like those you see inside The skulls in cemeteries.   So, while you are alive, Change your mind, my mistress, And don’t be sparing with your lips; All at once you will be dead, And then you will repent Of having been shy with me.   I’m dying, so kiss me. Oh Mistress, come near me. Like a quaking fawn you flee. At least allow my hand to rest, All a-tremble, on your breast, Or farther down still, if may be.

 

 in Greek myth, Charon’s boat took the dead across the River Styx to Hades, where Pluto ruled.

 

 Blanchemain varies the middle of the fourth stanza:

 

 

Pour qui gardes-tu tes yeux

Et ton sein delicieux,

Ta joue et ta bouche belle ? …

 

                                                                       For whom are you keeping your eyes

                                                                      And your delicious breast,

                                                                      Your cheeks, your lovely mouth? …

 

And there is one minor change later on, where he deletes the “un” in the 3rd line of the last stanza:  “Tu fuis comme Fan qui tremble”.  It is worth noting that these ‘stanzas’ were imported into ‘Cassandre’ after starting life elsewhere: though Blanchemain includes them there, in his 1560 edition they actually appeared among the Odes!

 

 

 

 

Odes 4, 11

Ma douce jouvence est passée,

Ma premiere force est cassée;

J’ay la dent noire et le chef blanc;

Mes nerfs sont dissous, et mes veines,

Tant j’ay le corps froid, ne sont pleines

Que d’une eau rousse au lieu de sang.

 

Adieu, ma lyre ; adieu, fillettes

Jadis mes douces amourettes,

Adieu, je sens venir ma fin ;

Nul passetemps de ma jeunesse

Ne m’accompagne en la vieillesse,

Que le feu, le lict et le vin.

 

J’ay la teste toute estourdie

De trop d’ans et de maladie ;

De tous costez le soin me mord,

Et, soit que j’aille ou que je tarde,

Tousjours après moy je regarde

Si je verray venir la mort,

 

Qui doit, ce me semble, à toute heure

Me mener là-bas, où demeure

Je ne sçay quel Pluton, qui tient

Ouvert à tous venans un antre,

Où bien facilement on entre,

Mais d’où jamais on ne revient.

 

 

 

                                                                                                My sweet youth has gone

                                                                                                My early strength is shattered

                                                                                                I have black teeth and a white head

                                                                                                My nerves are unstrung, and my veins

                                                                                                So cold is my body, seem to be filled

                                                                                                With nothing but red water instead of blood.

 

                                                                                                Farewell my lyre, farewell, girls

                                                                                                Who once were my little lovebirds,

                                                                                                Farewell, I feel my end coming;

                                                                                                No pastime of my youth

                                                                                                Accompanies me into old age

                                                                                                But my fire, my bed and my wine.

 

                                                                                                My head is completely dizzy

                                                                                                With too many years and with illness,

                                                                                                On all sides cares gnaw at me

                                                                                                And whether I go or delay

                                                                                                I am always looking behind me

                                                                                                In case I see death coming,

 

                                                                                                He who must, it seems to me, at any time

                                                                                                Lead me down there, where lives

                                                                                                Some Pluto who keeps

                                                                                                Open to all comers a cave

                                                                                                Which it’s easy to enter

                                                                                                But which no-one ever leaves.