And that goes for the Iliad VI quote as well-I was even thinking of DMing you on Twitter about how to stress animula, vagula, blandula... which would have felt like an imposition so to discover your substack and these sound files is marvellous. Thank you.
The biography in Historia Augusta suggests he wrote it when he was ill and dying, so he knew his time was up. The rather sour biographer also says 'he wrote a lot of poems in Greek, not much better than this one'! We don't have any of his other poems, unfortunately.
Sour comment indeed. I have no clue how it reads in its original language, but I thought it was very spot on and I admire the lucidity and calm. Might someone else have been writing them for him?
He was famously a lover of Greek culture. This poem is rather touching as you say, and I’m sure it’s his. The syntax is difficult re the last line, however, so perhaps there’s a line or two missing.
Such a boon to have the spoken version as well!
And that goes for the Iliad VI quote as well-I was even thinking of DMing you on Twitter about how to stress animula, vagula, blandula... which would have felt like an imposition so to discover your substack and these sound files is marvellous. Thank you.
How brave and how melancholy to write something like this. Did he know he was soon to die? How does this compare to his other poems?
The biography in Historia Augusta suggests he wrote it when he was ill and dying, so he knew his time was up. The rather sour biographer also says 'he wrote a lot of poems in Greek, not much better than this one'! We don't have any of his other poems, unfortunately.
Sour comment indeed. I have no clue how it reads in its original language, but I thought it was very spot on and I admire the lucidity and calm. Might someone else have been writing them for him?
He was famously a lover of Greek culture. This poem is rather touching as you say, and I’m sure it’s his. The syntax is difficult re the last line, however, so perhaps there’s a line or two missing.
Marguerite Yourcenar’s Memoirs of Hadrian begins with this poem. Wonderful.