Page:The Poems of Sappho (1924).djvu/47

Rh writer studied by the few for his historical and literary interest and by a larger number for other reasons. This book, an octavo, contains in addition to the translation of Petronius “by several hands,” versions of the works of Catullus, Tibullus, Propertius, Pindar, Anacreon, and Sappho. The Sapphic fragments occur on pages 325 and 328. Herbert’s version of the hymn is perhaps better than the company in which it is found. It consists of eight four-line stanzas, the Sapphic metre being ignored. Whatever majestic beauty the original derives from this element in the poem is therefore lost, and the translator has allowed his preconceptions to interfere with accuracy in rendering. For example, becomes “most knowing in the mystery of love,” a poor substitute for something more literal, besides containing a meaning entirely absent from the Greek word. Elijah Fenton, in his volume of “Poems on Several Occasions,” published in 1717, thought it worth while to include “Sappho to Phaon, a Love-epistle, translated from Ovid,” but for some reason, perhaps ignorance or lack of appreciation and understanding, he offered nothing of the real Sappho. He added, however, an epistle of “Phaon to Sappho,” which he states that he thought suitable. His translation had already appeared in 1712 in a volume of miscellaneous poems, published by Lintott, a volume which also contained the first appearance in print of Pope’s “Rape of the Lock.”