Russian sappho. Sappho biography and creative path
Semi-legendary biography
Sappho's biographical data is contradictory and controversial. Sappho was born on Lesbos, in the city of Mytilene (according to other sources, in the city of Eres). It is known that she belonged to the family of “new” Mytilene aristocrats; her father Skamandronim was engaged in trade. At the age of six, the girl was orphaned; her relatives sent her to a heter school. Sappho showed a rare sense of words and rhythm at an early age; Already at the school of hetaeras, she wrote odes, hymns, elegies, holiday and drinking songs. Sappho was not twenty years old when clashes began in Mytilene, caused by the confrontation between the leading aristocratic families and the demonstrations of the demos that arose against this background. She was a victim of the same circumstances that Alcaeus suffered; near Sappho and all her aristocratic relatives had to flee to Sicily. Only in , when Sappho was already over 30, was she able to return to her homeland.
According to legend, Alcaeus became interested in her at that time, but no mutual feelings arose between them. Subsequently, Sappho married the wealthy Andrian Kerkylas; she had a daughter (named after her mother, Kleis, or Cleida), to whom Sappho dedicated a cycle of poems. However, both Sappho's husband and child did not live long. Perhaps, trying to drown out her grief, Sappho surrendered to her natural sensuality and turned to “praising” lesbian girls and women - their beauty, tenderness, ability to empathize, sympathize, give and surrender.
Social status of women on the island. Lesbos (as in some other Dorian-Aeolian regions of the Greek world) was distinguished by greater freedom than that of the “traditional” Ionians. Women in social activity here had almost no restrictions; part of the family property, for example, could be transferred through the female line; Along with male heterias, similar associations of women remained on the island.
Sappho headed one of these commonwealths, the so-called. fias - a cult association dedicated to Aphrodite, one of whose tasks was to prepare noble girls for marriage. As part of this “program,” Sappho taught girls music, dancing, and poetry. Sappho's friends and students exchanged poems, which were primarily associated with ancient cults of femininity, etc.; on the basis of lesbian freedom of feeling and action, this “female” poetry (intended, especially, for “their listener”) naturally acquired frank content.
In ancient times, there were many legends about the relationship of the poetess to her friends and chosen ones. Such legends began with representatives of Attic comedy (the names of seven comedians are known who chose episodes from the life of Sappho as the plot of their plays). They, not fully understanding the meaning of Sappho's poetry, and referring to the cultural development of the Aeolian woman of the early 6th century BC. e. from the point of view of contemporary Athenian reality, they misinterpreted some hints about Sappho’s lifestyle.
Such mysterious episodes of her life include her love for the young man Phaon, who refused the poetess reciprocity, which is why she threw herself into the sea from the Leucadian rock (in Acarnania). The source of the legend about Phaon may have been the folk song about Adonis-Phaon (Phaethon), the favorite of Aphrodite, whose cult was widespread in the southern part of Asia Minor and on the islands adjacent to Asia Minor.
(The legend about the Lefkad rock itself is in connection with a ritual related to the cult of Apollo; on the Lefkad rock there was a temple of Apollo, from where every year, on a certain day, criminals were thrown into the sea as atonement victims. The expression “to throw yourself from the Lefkad rock” became , in everyday language, is equivalent to the expression “commit suicide” and also meant a threat to commit suicide under the influence of despair. In this sense, the Leucadian cliff is mentioned, for example, at Anacreon.)
Creation
Compiled in the Alexandrian period, the collection of Sappho's works consisted of 9 books, arranged partly according to metric headings, partly according to types of melos. “Sappho’s poetry was dedicated to love and beauty: the beauty of the body, girls and ephebes who solemnly competed with her at the temple of Hera on Lesbos; love, abstracted from the coarseness of the physiological impulse to the cult of feeling, built over issues of marriage and sex, tempering passion with the demands of aesthetics, causing an analysis of affect and the virtuosity of its poetic, conventional expression. From Sappho the way to Socrates: it was not for nothing that he called her his mentor in matters of love” (Academician Alexander Nikolaevich Veselovsky, “Three chapters from historical poetics”, 1899, p. 92).
In the works of Sappho, personal experiences are intertwined with the depiction of feelings and positions created creative imagination; “reality is confused with fiction,” as in Anacreon and Archilochus. Literary posterity did not bother to separate reality from fiction; Along with Phaon and Alcaeus, Sappho’s chosen ones included Anacreon, who lived 60 years later than her, and Archilochus and Hipponact, separated from each other by an interval of 150 years. Of the newest scientists, Muir treated Sappho most correctly in his “History of Greek Literature” (III, 315, 496).
Sappho's lyrics are based on traditional folkloric elements; here the motives of love and separation prevail, the action takes place against the backdrop of a bright and joyful nature, the murmuring of streams, the smoking of incense in the sacred grove of the goddess. Traditional forms of cult folklore are filled with personal experiences in Sappho; The main advantage of her poems is considered to be intense passion, naked feeling, expressed with extreme simplicity and brightness. Love as perceived by Sappho is terrible elemental force, “a bittersweet monster from which there is no defense.” Sappho seeks to convey her understanding by a synthesis of internal sensation and concrete sensory perception (fire under the skin, ringing in the ears, etc.).
Naturally, such emotions could not originate only in tradition. There are cases in Sappho’s life that “perfectly correspond” to the entire program of her work. Apuleius tells the story of how Sappho’s brother Charax, who was engaged in the wine trade, fell in love with the “beautiful courtesan” Rhodope on one of his trips to Egypt. When he bought her from her previous owner for a huge sum and brought her to Lesbos, Sappho herself lost her head from feelings for the Rhodope; the brother, having discovered this, did not find anything better than to leave home along with his “acquisition.”
“I loved, I called many in despair to my lonely bed,” wrote Sappho, reflecting on her fiasco, in the poem “To My Mistress.” “I spoke in the language of true passion... And let them dishonor me for throwing my heart into the abyss of pleasure, but at least I learned the divine secrets of life! My eyes, blinded by the brilliant light, saw the emerging dawn of divine love.”
About 170 fragments from Sappho’s works have survived to this day, including one entire poem. The following fragments deserve special attention (according to the 4th edition of Bergk, “Poetae Lyrici Graeci”, vol. III):
- 1st, which is the only complete poem by Sappho that has come down to us, in which the poetess, complaining about the girl’s indifference to her, calls on Aphrodite for help (Russian translations in prose by Pushkin, in verse by Vodovozova, 1888, and Korsha, M., 1899, in his essay “Roman Elegy and Romanticism”);
- 2nd, in which the poetess, tormented by jealousy, reveals her feelings (the 51st poem of Catullus is a slightly modified translation of this fragment; its Russian translation in prose was preserved in Pushkin’s rough notebook);
- 3rd, containing a comparison of a certain beauty with the moon, before which the stars fade;
- 28th, addressed to Alcaeus, in response to his love confession;
- 52nd, in which Sappho complains of loneliness in the silence of the night;
- 68th, representing part of the poem in which Sappho predicts an unknown fate for a woman alien to the cult of the muses;
- 85th, dedicated to his daughter;
- 93rd, dedicated to the beauty, who is compared to “a ruddy apple growing at the very top of a tall tree: the gardeners forgot to pick it... However, they did not forget: they could not get it”;
- The 95th is an appeal to the evening star (the 62nd poem of Catullus is an imitation of this fragment).
Along with poems intended for performance in fias, fragments of epithalamiums intended for a “wide listener” have also been preserved from Sappho. These were traditional wedding songs, reflecting the bride's farewell to her girlhood, and were performed by a choir of boys and girls before entering the marriage chamber. These poems were distinguished not so much by passion as by naivety and simplicity of tone; Fragments 91 and 98 are especially characteristic. An excellent description of Sappho’s epithalamiums is found in Himerius (Orat. 1, 4), who uses the images and expressions of the original. “Eternal” motifs of poetry of this kind - the nightingale, roses, Charitas, Eros, Peito, spring - are constantly present in the surviving fragments of Sappho’s poems. Sappho especially loves roses; in “The Crown of Meleager” (Anthol. Palat. IV, 1, 6) this flower is dedicated to her.
Metrics and rhythm
Sappho and "lesbian love"
Sappho’s work, filled with enthusiastic declarations of love, complaints of unsatisfied passion and jealousy, gave later biographers a reason to interpret the concept of “lesbian love” very unambiguously. The very word lesbian, meaning a homosexual woman, is in origin associated with Sappho and her circle. Regarding Sappho's relationship with women - the recipients of her poems - already in ancient times there were many controversial opinions.
This opinion was expressed in ancient times by the philosopher of the late 2nd century. BC e. Maximus of Tire (24th Discourse). It is also possible that Sappho’s jealousy of her rivals, Iorgo and Andromeda, was caused not by a feeling of unsatisfied love, but by a sense of competition on the basis of poetic and musical art. One way or another, Sappho’s contemporaries did not see anything reprehensible in anything like this. Sappho was respected by Alcaeus,
Sappho (or Sappho)
If love is a divine passion, stronger than the enthusiasm of the Delphic priestesses, bacchantes and priests of Cybella, then Sappho, or Sappho, is its best personification.
Passionate Sappho, as her contemporaries called her, was born on the island of Lesbos in the city of Eros in the Forty-second Olympiad, 612 years BC. e. Her father's name was Scamandronim, her mother's name was Cleida. In addition to Sappho, they had three sons: Charax, Larich and Euryg.
When Sappho was six years old, she was left an orphan. In 595 BC. e. unrest began, leading to the overthrow of the aristocracy. The young girl fled to Sicily with her brothers and was only able to return to Lesbos fifteen years later. She settled in Mytilene, which is why they later began to call her Sappho of Mytilene, in contrast to the other Sappho of Eres, an ordinary courtesan who lived much later than the famous poetess.
Sappho, who was brought up in the school of hetaeras, early felt a calling to poetry. Her passionate nature could not hide the feelings that worried her. She wrote odes, hymns, elegies, epitaphs, festive and stagnant songs in verse called “sapphic” in her honor. With a lyre in her hands, she recited her hot stanzas. All her works are either calls for love, or complaints about it, full of passionate pleas and ardent desires. She had a huge influence on Horace and Catullus, a kindred spirit singer of tender feelings and passions. Strabo did not call her anything other than a “miracle,” arguing that “it is in vain to look in the entire course of history for a woman who in poetry could bear even an approximate comparison with Sappho.” Socrates calls her his mentor in matters of love.
Alas, the gods, who gave her the noble and pure genius of poetry, did not take care of her appearance. According to contemporaries, Sappho was small in stature, very dark, but with lively, sparkling eyes, and if Socrates called her “most beautiful,” it was solely for the beauty of her verse. This is what Ovid said through the mouth of Sappho: “If ruthless nature has denied me beauty, I compensate for its damage with my mind. I am small in stature, but with my name I can fill all countries. I am not white-faced, but Perseus liked the daughter of Cephaus (Andromeda). However, one can believe that the poetess’s face, in moments of supreme inspiration, transformed and became truly beautiful.
Upon Sappho’s return from Sicily, a romance began between the “tenth muse” (in Plato’s words) and the “hater of tyrants,” the poet Alcaeus, her companion in exile, which, however, did not have serious consequences. Alcay, of course, could not help but be carried away by the elegant girl, richly gifted with talents. The poet told her that he would like to confess his love to her, but did not dare: “I would say it, but I’m ashamed.” To which Sappho replied: “If what you want to say were decent, shame would hardly bother you.” Undoubtedly, they were close, but how close will remain a mystery.
Soon Sappho married, it is unknown to whom, and a year later gave birth to a daughter, named after her grandmother Cleida. But a merciless fate did not allow her to enjoy family happiness for long. The husband and beloved daughter soon, one after another, descended into the dark kingdom of Gales. Deprived of a family, Sappho devoted herself entirely to poetry and transferred all the passion of her nature to lesbian girls.
Women in those distant times were not satisfied with men alone and started relationships with each other. Lesbians, in addition to lovers, had mistresses, next to whom they reclined at feasts, fell asleep at night in their arms and surrounded them with the most tender cares. Lucian wrote in the Dialogues: “The women of Lesbos were indeed subject to this passion, but Sappho found it in the customs and morals of her country, and did not at all invent it herself.” It is difficult to deny the existence of “lesbian love” when the “queen of poets” is its direct exponent. Sappho was supposed to love, adore, worship everything that is truly beautiful. And what is more beautiful than a woman?
Sappho headed the school of rhetoric in Mytilene, although some writers claim that she herself founded it, calling it the House of the Muses, where not only lesbians, but also foreigners sought to enter. Passion for her friends aroused extraordinary ecstasy in Sappho. “Love destroys my soul like a whirlwind overturning mountain oaks,” said the poetess. “As for me, I will give myself over to voluptuousness as long as I can see the shine of the radiant light and admire everything that is beautiful!”
Sappho adored both men and women who could give her pleasure and sweet intoxication of the senses.
At the height of the feast, when wine called the “milk of Aphrodite” was boiling in a goblet, Sappho reclined in a passionate pose next to Attida, Iorgo or Telesippa, the “beautiful warrior,” reveling in the sweetness of love relationships. However, she also longed for the presence of men, to whom she was also not indifferent. And, of course, the muse intoxicated her and delighted her.
Some researchers suggest that Sappho’s poem “To My Mistress” is dedicated to Rhodope, which the poetess was jealous of her brother Charax. From the story of Apuleius it follows that Charax, who was engaged in the wine trade, once saw a beauty in the city of Naucratis with whom he fell deeply in love. He bought her from slavery for a huge sum and brought her to Mytilene. Sappho, having met the girl, was inflamed with a burning passion for the courtesan, but she did not think to answer her. This coldness drove the poetess crazy, burning with desire. Constant quarrels between brother and sister forced Charax to return Rhodope to Naucratis, where he hoped to be the only owner of the beauty. But fate was against him: when Rhodope “immersed her hot body in the chilly waters of the Nile,” an eagle carried away one of her sandals and, by incredible chance, dropped it in front of Amasis, who stood in the vestibule of the temple awaiting a sacrifice. The sandal turned out to be so small that the pharaoh ordered to find its owner, who undoubtedly had amazing feet. The courtiers went in search and, after long wanderings, found the beauty and brought her to their ruler. Enchanted by the Rhodope, Amasis either married her or made her his mistress. In any case, she was lost to Charax. Undoubtedly, this legend served as the plot for Cinderella. In Greece, the Egyptian courtesan was glorified under the name Dorica, and Sappho's poems immortalized her brother's mistress.
Sappho is believed to have died around 572 BC. e., committing suicide. Who inspired Sappho with such passionate feelings? Legends point to the young Greek Phaon, who transported passengers from Lesbos or Chios to the opposite Asian coast. Sappho fell passionately in love with him, but, not finding reciprocity, threw herself from the Lefkad cliff into the sea. According to legend, those who suffered from mad love found oblivion on Lefkada.
However, some writers, without even mentioning the circumstances under which Sappho died, attribute the adventures with Phaon to Sappho of Ephesus.
In honor of Sappho, the Mytilenians minted her image on coins. Can anything more be done even for the queen?
Sappho (Sappho, ca. 630-572 BC) Fresco in Pompeii
I only see your shining appearance -
I can't breathe calmly.
It's painfully happy to be around
you -
Only the gods are worthy of him.
I can't breathe, my throat is burning
cramped.
It's like the sound of the ocean in my ears.
I'm going deaf, it's dark in my eyes, and
light.
And the heart beats tirelessly...
Sappho was born on the island of Lesvos.
Lesvos is one of the largest Greek islands in the Mediterranean Sea.
It is located far from the shores of Hellas, but to Asia Minor, the present
Turkey's western coast is just around the corner.
Therefore, the whole way of life on Lesbos was, so to speak,
a little with an oriental accent.
In a family, not the most aristocratic, but quite noble, the future
the poetess was named Psaptha, which is how her name was pronounced in Aeolian. Already
later, when it thundered throughout Hellas, it was changed to Sappho,
and even later, with the advent of French translations of her poems,
the name became Sappho.
From childhood, Sappho took part in holidays, wedding ceremonies,
religious mysteries that glorified the goddess of love Aphrodite, the goddess of the earth
and fertility Hera, the goddess of wildlife and hunting Artemis.
Women and girls carried garlands of flowers and sang hymns,
sang love and life-giving forces.
IN Ancient Greece Priestly functions were very often performed by women. More often
In all, they were priestesses of temples and soothsayers. At some temples
so-called temple prostitution was practiced - “priestesses of love”
were given to anyone who wanted it, and such sexual intercourse was considered mystical
merging with the deity. But there were also, so to speak, informal priestesses:
women of the same circle gathered in the house of one of their friends, learned
hymns and ritual actions, and then performed them at weddings
and during sacred ceremonies.
Such a circle of female priestesses gathered in the house of Scamandronimus,
Sappho's father. We can say that from an early age the girl grew up in an atmosphere of deification of love.
Mytilene - the capital of Lesvos in modern times
Even in ancient times, philosophers and poets argued about Sappho’s appearance.
Plato called her beautiful. Another philosopher agreed,
although with reservations: “We can call her that, although she was dark-skinned
and short stature.” Yes, Sappho did not correspond to the ideal of antiquity -
The Greeks and Romans liked statuesque blond women with fair skin.
But this is not why Sappho “took” it. A lively mind, talent and temperament illuminate a woman from within,
endow with a special charm.
Sappho got married and had a daughter, but her husband and daughter did not live long.
The family life of Sappho and her husband was hardly different from life
other noble Greek families. In ancient times people got married and got married
at the will of the parents. If there was love between the newlyweds at first,
then this gift of Aphrodite is not eternal.
And after several years, the couple moved away from each other.
Husbands lived their lives, wives theirs. The man's world was in sight: war,
politics, entertainment - baths, hetaeras, young men. Women's world was
more closed, hidden. A circle formed in Sappho's house,
a kind of salon where the enlightened women of Mytilene gathered,
Elemental chants sounded, dances and mysteries were performed.
The circle of Sappho's fans expanded.
Her poetic hymns and prayers were imbued with such personal feeling,
such passion that those around them were convinced: the poetess directly
communicates with the gods. “I spoke to Cyprida in my sleep,” wrote Sappho.
At her call, the goddess of love appeared, “driving a golden chariot,”
and listened favorably to her pleas.
Lawrence Alma Tadema Sappho and Alcaeus
Sappho now has pupils - young girls,
whom Sappho taught the basics of religion, the fine arts,
noble manners, and most importantly - prepared for a future marriage.
Gradually, the poetess became a mentor of sorts
closed school for “education of feelings.” Girls from noble families
Lesvos entered as teenagers and left in the prime of womanhood
right down the aisle. She took Sappho under her guardianship and
refugee girls. Many families moved to Lesvos from Greek
cities of Asia Minor, constantly under attack by local kings.
A separate group of pupils were slaves; they were not specially taught,
they were “unwitting listeners” and participants in the classes.
Probably, her own experience prompted the poetess to create
"boarding house for noble maidens." After all, very young Sappho became a wife,
being completely unprepared for marriage, and as a result -
What could she experience in her intimate life other than disappointment?
Gradually, sisterly friendship between the pupils
turned into love. Sappho believed that, having learned to love her friend,
the girl will learn to love and accept the love of her future husband.
The poetess enthusiastically praised the relationships that arise between friends.
Take the harp in your hands, Abantis,
And sing about your friend Gongilla!
You see, her passion is again
A bird soars above you...
Oh, I'm glad about this!
V. Korbakov Poetess Sappho reads poems about love to lesbians
In addition to this “sweet couple”, from Sappho’s poems we learn the names of many
her other friends and students. In front of her mentor’s eyes, they are awkward
teenagers turned into lovely creatures. Beauty is also
one deity of Ancient Greece, perhaps the most powerful.
The physical beauty of a boy or girl, man or woman was
the main reason for the emergence of love.
At the same time, attraction to a person of the same sex is not
condemned. In personal life only incest was prohibited and condemned
adultery. For example, the Greeks harshly condemned the wife of a Spartan
King Helen, because of whom the Trojan War broke out.
But Sappho was independent in her judgments, she was the first to justify Elena
- after all, she loved, which means she is not subject to jurisdiction.
G. Klimt Sappho Vienna
Conquering everyone on earth with beauty,
Elena forgot everyone -
Both husband and dear child:
The power of Cyprida drove the fugitive away.
Sappho often fell in love with her students.
And these were strong, deep feelings. The poetess masterfully conveyed
the mental turmoil of nascent love:
“Eros is tormenting me again, weary-
Bittersweet, irresistible serpent."
Then passion overwhelmed her: “I burn and go mad with passion...”
She was jealous: “Who else do you love more than me?”
She grieved if the girl lost interest in her: “...you forgot about me.”
And she complained: “Those to whom I give so much, cause the most torment.”
However, it happened that she herself rejected someone else’s love, sometimes with ridicule:
“I’ve never met anyone nastier than you, my dear!”
Raphael Sappho Vatican
But there was also something completely new, unprecedented, that Sappho brought into her practice.
salon is the creation of " triple alliances" Pedagogical thought here
was this: in fact, what can each other learn from each other?
two young girls, almost girls? But if in their friendly and loving
communication, especially in erotic games, will be directly
a more experienced partner will participate, skillfully guiding and tender words,
and caresses... But let’s not judge the women of that ancient time too harshly.
Their world only to an insignificant degree reflected the male world with all its vices.
It would seem that Socrates was virtuous.
So after all, he loved his students - in the most literal sense of the word.
6th century BC
After the new king came to power, the Sappho family had to go to
exile. For almost ten years, Sappho lived in Sicily, in Panorma (now Palermo).
But it was then that her fame spread throughout Greece.
Her images began to appear here and there, along with gods and heroes,
her profile was minted on coins,
the lines of her poems were not only copied on papyri,
but also applied to clay vessels.
Sappho Vase 5th century BC
Still from the film about Sappho
By the way, thanks to this, many fragments have reached us: clay is stronger than paper.
When Sappho was able to return to Lesbos,
she was already over forty. This is a very respectable age for a woman of that era.
Her house was still the “house of the muses,” but in in the same form Sapphic fias
(the community) has not been revived. Passions subsided in the soul of the poetess, they were replaced by
thoughts about the eternal came:
“Wealth alone is an unreliable companion,
If virtue does not walk alongside.”
The dissolute brother Charax caused her a lot of grief in her declining years.
He successfully traded olives and wine (Lesbos wine and olives were considered
the best in Greece), but one day he fell in love with a beautiful slave of one
Mytilenian, her name was Doriha. Charax bought the slave, or she ran away from
owner, they only sailed away together to Naucratis, a Greek colony in
Nile Delta. Sappho, as in previous years, made a plea to her
intercessor Aphrodite, so that she would “drain” her brother from the whore,
returned him to his family. But the goddess of love did not appear to Sappho. Apparently the goddess
new favorites have appeared.
Meanwhile, Dorikha extracted all the money from Kharaks, and he returned home
goal like a falcon. And Dorikha became the most famous heterosexual in the colony.
When she died, her many lovers erected a monument on her grave
luxurious monument.
Sappho 6th century BC
Sappho was getting old. This is a difficult test for any woman.
Especially for the poetess, who, as a contemporary wrote,
“I loved with a lyre in my hands.” And yet, when there is no one else to love,
the last, great love remains - the love of life.
Death is evil. This is how the gods established it:
If it weren't for this, the gods would be mortal.
Perhaps this thought of Sappho supported her in recent years.
There are different versions of the poetic legend about Sappho,
that she fell in love with the sailor Phaon,
who despised women and was only interested in the sea.
Jacques-Louis David Sappho and Phaon Hermitage
Every day he sailed out to sea on a boat,
and Sappho waited for his return on the rock.
One day he did not return, and Sappho threw herself off a cliff into the sea.
Antoine-Jean Gros. "Sappho on the Leucadian Rock", 1801
Plato called Sappho “the tenth muse.” She, without hiding, opened her soul,
and in it is the boundless world of love. A true masterpiece of Sappho’s lyrics
is considered a poem without a title, which in Russian literature received
title "2nd ode". It has been translated and retold by eminent poets
different countries. In Russia, it was addressed starting from the 18th century by N.A. Lvov,
V.A. Zhukovsky, A.S. Pushkin, D.V. Davydov, many other poets.
It turned out that all the named poets translated the 2nd ode to Sappho precisely at the time
their love, this was for them an expression of passionate recognition.
Pushkin freely rearranged only the first stanzas of the 2nd ode:
Happy is he who is near you, lover
intoxicated,
Without languid timidity yours catches
bright gaze,
Cute movements, playful conversation
And a trace of an unforgettable smile.
Pushkin’s “languid timidity” becomes understandable if you know
that the dedication “K***” means - E.A. Karamzina, the wife of the great
historiographer and writer Karamzin. Young Pushkin was secretly infatuated with her,
of course, without the slightest hope of reciprocity.
In the original, of course, Sappho's poem is completely different.
A more passionate confession is unlikely to be found in world poetry.
woman in love.
...As soon as I see you, I can’t bear it
Say the words.
One moment - and the tongue goes numb,
The heat quickly runs under the skin,
And the eyes don't see, there's ringing in the ears
incessant...
Here the experience of love is brought to physiological sensations,
and any doctor, after reading it, will say: the heroine’s blood pressure is off the charts,
the temperature rises, fever sets in. And the degree of passion is heating up:
The whole body is covered, the color of withered grass
Suddenly the skin becomes, it seems to me -
I'm about to give up my life!..
More than 30 years ago, the famous album of David Tukhmanov was released
“In the wake of my memory” (1975). The second track of the disc was just the song
to the poems of Sappho, that same 2nd ode. The intensity of passion was literally shocking,
and the music was good.
A poem by Sappho, set to music by D. Tukhmanov:
Fortunately, it seems to me equal to God
The man who is so close
Sitting in front of you, your sounding gentle
Listens to the voice
And a lovely laugh. I have at the same time
My heart would immediately stop beating:
As soon as I see you, I can’t
Say a word.
But the tongue immediately goes numb, under the skin
A fleeting heat runs through, they look,
Seeing nothing, eyes, ears -
The ringing is continuous.
Then I'm covered in heat, trembling
Members are all covered, greener
I'm becoming grass, and it's almost as if
I will say goodbye to life.
But be patient, be patient: it’s too far
Everything went well...
Translation by V. Veresaev
However, the unspoiled Soviet listener did not understand
what a dramatic situation is reflected in these verses.
The fact is that the source text for translations and transcriptions
The 2nd ode were French poems by Boileau, who, in turn,
inspired by the Latin retelling of Catullus. And only appeal
to the ancient Greek original represents true drama.
The heroes of the poem are not only She (the heroine and the author) and He, there are
and the third (or third):
That lucky man, like God,
Who is sitting close to you,
Listens in fascination to a gentle voice
And a lovely laugh...
This is a woman in love who sees her rival (or rival) next to her beloved
a person who is desperately jealous and loves at the same time. That's why these lines
are also riddled with pain...By and large, the composition characters and them
gender is not so important - to such a transcendental height
Sappho exalted her love.
She belonged to the family aristocracy. She also lived in exile for a long time (on the island of Sicily), but, according to her biography, at the end of her life she returned to her homeland, where, according to legend, she died, throwing herself from a cliff into the sea because of unrequited love for the young man Phaon. This biographical legend reflects the nature of Sappho's lyrics, main theme which was love.
Most of the poems of Sappho, one of the brightest representatives of ancient Greek lyricism, are dedicated to her friends, many of whom, as we know, also wrote poetry. This would be impossible if they lived, for example, in Athens, where the woman was a recluse and where her pursuit of literature would only cause condemnation.
The political theme was not reflected in Sappho’s work, although it had an impact strong influence to her biography. The poetess rarely goes beyond her personal experiences. This feature of Sappho’s work is manifested in one of the most famous poems, composed in the form of a hymn to the gods and containing persistent epithets of the deity, invocations, etc., characteristic of the hymn.
“Glorious Aphrodite with a motley throne,
Zeus's daughter, skilled in cunning forges!
I beg you, don’t make me heartbroken
Good hearts!
But come to me as often before
You responded to my distant call
And, leaving her father’s palace, she rose
To the chariot
Golden. I rushed you from the sky
There is a flock of cute sparrows above the ground;
The swift wings of the birds fluttered
In the distance of the ether.
And, appearing with a smile on the eternal face.
You, blessed one, asked me,
What is my sadness, and why the goddess
I urge
And what do I want for a troubled soul?
In whom Peyto should, point out, with love
Kindle the spirit for you? I neglected you
Who, my Psappha?
Running away? - He will start chasing you.
Doesn't take gifts? - He will hurry with the gifts.
No love for you? - And it will flare up with love,
Whether he wants or not.
Oh come to me now! From bitter
Deliver the spirit of sorrow and why so passionately
I want, accomplish and be a faithful ally
Be me, goddess!
(Sappho. Hymn to Aphrodite. Translation by V.V. Veresaev).
A wonderful poem is where Sappho describes the experiences she experiences in the presence of her loved one. Although this cannot be called a psychological analysis of a feeling, but rather a description of its external manifestations (“...the tongue immediately goes numb, a light heat quickly runs under the skin, the eyes look without seeing anything...”), nevertheless this is a more expressive image feelings than in the fragments that have come down to us from other poets of this and later times.
Sappho and Alcaeus. Painting by L. Alma-Tadema, 1881
Flowers, spring, sun, gold, colors of nature are common motifs in the poetry of Sappho, who, like Alcaeus, is one of the first in Greek literature to describe the beauty of nature.
“Casting down from above, a cool stream
Sends its murmur through the branches of apple trees,
And deep sleep flows from the trembling leaves all around.”
Sappho praises beauty in everything: in nature, in people, in clothing. She compares her little daughter to a “golden flower.” But the poetess places spiritual qualities above beauty:
“Who is beautiful - only the sight pleases us,
Whoever is good will seem beautiful by himself.”
(Sappho; trans. V.V. Veresaev).
Elsewhere Sappho says, “What is beautiful is what we love.”
Epithalamus (wedding songs) and other songs close to ritual ones have reached us in fragments, and this increases the value of Sappho’s heritage, since we do not have Greek folklore “in its pure form” and can only judge it from the poems of those poets who freely or unwittingly imitated folk art. Such poets included Sappho with her tragic biography, who also had love, as most often happens in folk songs, is of a mournful nature: this is for the most part a painful feeling, unrequited or poisoned by the bitterness of separation.
Sappho. Video of the Encyclopedia project
Sappho's poetry was very popular in subsequent centuries, both in Greece and Rome. The Roman poets Catullus and Horace often used the “sapphic stanza,” that is, one of the poetess’s favorite stanzas, which in Russian translation reads like this:
“It seems to me fortunately that I am equal to God
The man who is so close
Sitting in front of you, your sounding gentle
Listens to the voice"
(Sappho; trans. V.V. Veresaev).
Biographical information about Sappho is scarce and contradictory. Sappho was born on the island of Lesbos. Her father Scamandronim was a “new” aristocrat; being a representative of a noble family, he was engaged in trade. Her mother's name was Cleida. In addition to Sappho, they had three sons. At the age of six, the girl was orphaned and her relatives sent her to a heter school. Sappho showed a sense of words and rhythm at an early age; already at the school of hetaeras she wrote odes, hymns, elegies, holiday and drinking songs.
In the middle of the 7th century. BC e. abolition takes place in Mytilene royal power, whose place was taken by the oligarchy of the royal family of the Penfilids. Soon the power of the Penfelides fell as a result of a conspiracy, and a struggle for primacy broke out between the leading aristocratic families. In 618 BC. e. power in the city was seized by a certain Melancher, whom ancient authors call the first tyrant of Mytilene. Soon Melancher, through the combined efforts of the poet Alcaeus, his brothers and the future tyrant of Mytilene Pittacus, was overthrown and killed. A certain Myrsil became the tyrant of Mytilene, whose policy was directed against certain representatives of the old Mytilene nobility, and many aristocrats, including the Sappho family, were forced to flee the city (between 612 and 618 BC). Sappho was in exile in Syracuse on the island of Sicily until the death of Myrsila (between 595 and 579 BC), when she was able to return to her homeland.
She settled in the city of Mytilene, which is why they later began to call her Sappho of Mytilene. According to legend, Alcaeus became interested in her at this time. And even fragments of their lyrics are combined into a poetic dialogue as proof of this, but this was impossible - Alcaeus and Sappho are representatives of different generations. There is another legend about the poetess - that she fell in love with the sailor Phaon, who despised women and was only interested in the sea. Every day he sailed away on a boat, and according to legend, Sappho waited for his return on a rock. One day Phaon did not return, and she threw herself into the water. This legend is an interweaving of the myth about the sea deity of the island of Lesvos, Phaon, who once transported Aphrodite, and she gave him a special potion, thanks to which all the women who saw him fell in love. This myth was beautifully intertwined with the famous poetess Sappho, and thus this legend arose.
Sappho married the wealthy Andrian Kerkylas; she had a daughter (named after Sappho's mother, Kleis, or Cleida), to whom Sappho dedicated a cycle of poems. Both Sappho's husband and child did not live long.
Social status of women on the island. Lesbos (and Aeolis in general) was distinguished by greater freedom than in other areas of the Greek world. Women in social activity here had almost no restrictions; part of the family property, for example, could be transferred through the female line; Along with the male heterias, the fias (fias, Greek thiasos - “meeting, procession”), similar to the commonwealth of women, were preserved on the island. Sappho headed such a fias - a cult association dedicated to Aphrodite, one of whose tasks was to prepare noble girls for marriage. As part of the fiasa program, Sappho taught girls music, dancing, and poetry.
Chronology
Strabo reports that Sappho was a contemporary of Alcaeus of Mytilene (born about 620 BC) and Pittacus (about 645 - 570 BC); according to Athenaeus, she was a contemporary of King Alyattes (c. 610-560 BC). Suda, a 10th-century Byzantine encyclopedia, dates her to the 42nd Olympiad (612/608 BC), having in It means either that she was born at this time, or that these were the years of her activity. According to Eusebius of Caesarea, she was known by the first or second year of the 45th or 46th Olympiad (between 600 and 594 BC). Summarizing these sources, we can say that she was most likely born around 620. BC e., or a little earlier.
According to the Parian Chronicle, she was exiled from Lesbos to Sicily between 604 and 594. BC e. If we take the 98th fragment of her poems as biographical evidence and relate it to her own daughter (see below), this may mean that she already had a daughter by the time she was exiled. If we consider the 58th fragment autobiographical, then she lived to old age. If we consider her acquaintance with the Rhodopes to be historically reliable (see below), this means that she lived in the middle of the 6th century. BC e.
Family
The Oxyrhynchus Papyrus (circa 200 AD) and the Suda agree that Sappho's mother was named Kleis and that she had a daughter who bore the same name. A line of papyrus reads: “She [Sappho] had a daughter, Kleis, whom she named after her mother.” (Duban 1983, p. 121) Kleis is mentioned in two surviving fragments of Sappho's poems. In Fragment 98, Sappho addresses Cleis, saying that he cannot get her a decorated hair ribbon. The one hundred and thirty-second fragment reads in full as follows: “I have a beautiful child, like golden flowers, my dear Kleis, whom I would not (give) for all Lydia or dear...” These fragments are often interpreted as referring to Sappho’s daughter or confirming, that Sappho had a daughter named Kleis. But even if we accept the biographical reading of the poem, this is not necessarily the case. In fragment 132, Kleis is called by the Greek word pais ("child"), which can also mean a slave or any young girl as a child. It is possible that these lines, or others similar to them, were misunderstood by ancient writers, resulting in an erroneous biographical tradition that has survived to this day.
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In the 102nd fragment, the lyrical heroine addresses her “dear mother,” from which it is sometimes concluded that Sappho began writing poetry when her mother was still alive. According to most historical sources, Sappho's father's name was Scamandronimus; he is not mentioned in any of the surviving fragments. In Ovid's Heroides, Sappho mourns him with these words: “Six of my birthdays passed when the bones of my parent, collected from the funeral pyre, drank up my tears before their time.” Perhaps Ovid wrote these lines based on a poem by Sappho that has not survived to this day.
It was written about Sappho that she had three brothers: Erigius (or Eurigius), Laricus and Charax. The Oxyrhynchus papyrus says that Charax was the eldest, but Sappho liked the younger Laricus more. Athenaeus wrote that Sappho praised Laricus for pouring wine in the administration building of Mytilene, an institution in which young men from the best families served. This evidence that Sappho was born into an aristocratic family is consistent with the elegant setting in which some of her poems are set.
Herodotus, and later Strabo, Athenaeus, Ovid and Suda, tell the story of the relationship between Charax and the Egyptian courtesan Rhodope. Herodotus, the most ancient source, who mentions this story, reports that Charax bought Rhodope from slavery for a large sum, and after he returned with her to Mytilene, Sappho criticized him in verse. Strabo, who lived 400 years later, adds that Charax traded in Lesbian wine, and Sappho called the Rhodope "Doricha". Athenaeus, another 200 years later, calls the courtesan Doricha, and states that Herodotus confused her with Rhodope, a completely different woman. He also quotes an epigram from Poseidippus (3rd century BC) which refers to Dorica and Sappho. Based on these stories, scholars have suggested that Doricha may be mentioned in Sappho's poems. None of the surviving fragments contain this name in full, but fragments 7 and 15 are often thought to contain a fragment of the word "Doricha". Modern researcher Joel Lidov has criticized this assumption, arguing that the tradition of Dorich will not help restore any fragments of Sappho's poems and that it originated from the works of Cratinus or another comedian who lived at the same time as Herodotus.
Suda is the only source that states that Sappho was married to "a very rich merchant named Kerkylas, who lived in Andria" and that he was Kleis' father. This legend may have been a joke invented by comic poets, since the name of the supposed husband literally means "member from the district of men."
Exile
Sappho's life was a period of political unrest in Lesbos and the rise of Pittacus. According to the Parian Chronicle, Sappho was exiled to Sicily between 604 and 594; Cicero notes that her statue stood in the Syracuse administration building. Unlike the poems of her friend Alcaeus, Sappho's surviving works contain almost no allusions to political conditions. The main exception is fragment 98, which mentions exile and shows that Sappho lacked some of the luxuries she was accustomed to. Her political sympathies may have belonged to the Alcaeus party. Although there is no clear evidence for this, it is generally assumed that Sappho returned from exile at some point and spent most of her life on Lesbos.
The Legend of Phaon
Tradition, going back at least to the works of Menander (fragment 258 K), suggests that Sappho committed suicide by throwing herself off the Leucadian cliffs out of unrequited love for the ferryman Phaon. Modern scholars consider this story to be apocryphal, perhaps invented by comic poets or based on a misreading of a first-person narrative in a non-biographical poem. In part, this legend may have arisen from a desire to prove that Sappho was heterosexual.
Creation
Sappho's lyrics are based on traditional folkloric elements; here the motives of love and separation prevail, the action takes place against the backdrop of a bright and joyful nature, the murmuring of streams, the smoking of incense in the sacred grove of the goddess. Traditional forms of cult folklore are filled with personal experiences in Sappho; The main advantage of her poems is considered to be intense passion, naked feeling, expressed with extreme simplicity and brightness. Love in the perception of Sappho is a terrible elemental force, “a bittersweet monster from which there is no protection.” Sappho seeks to convey her understanding by a synthesis of internal sensation and concrete sensory perception (fire under the skin, ringing in the ears, etc.).
Naturally, such emotions could not originate only in tradition. There are known cases in Sappho’s life that may have had a direct impact on the emotional structure of her work. Eg. Apuleius tells the story of how Sappho’s brother Charax, who was engaged in the wine trade, fell in love with the “beautiful courtesan” Rhodope on one of his trips to Egypt. When he bought her from her previous owner for a huge sum and brought her to Lesbos, Sappho herself lost her head from feelings for the Rhodope; the brother, having discovered this, did not find anything better than to leave home along with his “acquisition.”
Along with poems intended for performance in fias, fragments from Sappho have also been preserved intended for a wide audience; eg epithalamiums, traditional wedding songs depicting the bride's farewell to her girlhood, intended to be performed by a choir of boys and girls before entering the marriage chamber. These poems were distinguished not so much by passion as by naivety and simplicity of tone. “Eternal” motifs of poetry of this kind - the nightingale, roses, Charitas, Eros, Peito, spring - are constantly present in the surviving fragments of Sappho’s poems. Sappho attaches particular importance to the rose; in the “Wreath of Meleager” this flower is dedicated to her.
Sappho's hymns apparently had no relation to the cult and were of a subjective nature; they were called invocations (κλητικοί), since each was addressed to some deity.
Finally, elegies and epigrams are attributed to Sappho.
“Sappho’s poetry was dedicated to love and beauty: the beauty of the body, girls and ephebes who solemnly competed with her at the temple of Hera on Lesbos; love, abstracted from the coarseness of the physiological impulse to the cult of feeling, built on issues of marriage and sex, tempering passion with the demands of aesthetics, causing an analysis of affect and the virtuosity of its poetic, conventional expression. From Sappho the way to Socrates: it was not for nothing that he called her his mentor in matters of love” (Academician A. N. Veselovsky).
Sexuality and poetry circle
The center of Sappho's poetry is love and passion for different characters of both sexes. The word "lesbian" comes from the name of her home island of Lesbos, and in English language the word “sapphic” derived from her name is also used; both of these words began to be used to refer to female homosexuality only in the 19th century. Lyrical heroines Many of her poems speak of passionate infatuation or love (sometimes mutual, sometimes not) for various women, but descriptions of bodily contact between women are rare and controversial. It is unknown whether these poems were autobiographical, although references to other areas of Sappho's life are found in her works, and poetic expression of these intimate experiences would have been consistent with her style. Her homoeroticism must be understood in the context of the seventh century BC. The poems of Alcaeus, and later Pindar, describe similar romantic bonds between members of a certain circle.
Alcaeus, a contemporary of Sappho, spoke of her like this: “With violet curls, pure, tenderly smiling Sappho” (ἰόπλοκ᾽ ἄγνα μελλιχόμειδε Σάπφοι, fragment 384). The third-century philosopher Maximus of Tyre wrote that Sappho was “dark and short” and that in her relationships with her friends she was like Socrates: “How else can we call the love of this lesbian woman if not the art of love of Socrates? After all, it seems to me that they understood love in their own way: she loved women, he loved men. After all, they, as they say, loved many, and were passionate about everything beautiful. What Alcibiades, Charmides and Phaedrus were for him, so were Girinna, Attida and Anactoria for her...”
IN Victorian era It was fashionable to describe Sappho as the headmistress of a boarding school for noble maidens. As Page DuBois (and many other experts) point out, this attempt to make Sappho understandable and acceptable to British high society was based more on conservative sentiments than on historical facts. In the scanty collection of Sappho's surviving poems, teaching, students, schools, or teachers are never mentioned. Burnett, as well as other scholars, including S. M. Bour, believe that Sappho's circle was in some ways similar to Spartan military boys' camps (agelai) or sacred religious groups (thiasos), but Burnett qualifies his argument by noting, that Sappho's circle was different from these contemporary examples because "participation in it appears to have been voluntary, irregular, and to some extent multinational." However, the idea remains that Sappho ran some kind of school.