Page:The Poems of Sappho (1924).djvu/58

52 long lyrics. He emphasizes “the amazing power of Greek words as words,” and says that this is shown “in such a way that phrases like ripe fruit clusters seem bursting with a rich juice of passionate meaning.” He notes also the marvellous “verbal economy” of Sappho, and the comprehensiveness and power of such a word as, Critical appreciation, not translation, is the purpose of this article.

In 1903 J. R. Tutin published at Cottingham, near Hull, a small pamphlet in grey wrappers, which contained various selected translations of most of the Sapphic fragments, but without commentary and without Greek text. There is a short prefatory note explaining the reasons for the issue of the compilation.

A comprehensive discourse on the subject of Sappho was a lecture by Professor Tucker, of Melbourne, delivered in 1913 before the Classical Association of Vitoria, and published in 1914. It is an appreciative and discriminating thesis, and among its other good points it gives short shrift to the Leucadian rock story and to the scandals of the Greek comic writers and their Roman plagiarists in this connection. Not much attention is given to English translations, except in using them to illustrate comparative poetical construction and form. Some writers, especially the earlier ones, emphasize the disadvantages of English as a language into which to translate Greek poetry, the inference being that English as a