May 29th is the anniversary of the Fall of Constantinople in 1453, a momentous watershed in late medieval history. The Byzantine Empire had long been gradually receding against the expansion of Ottoman Turks, and in 1453 the final deah-blow was delivered with the capturing of the capital and death of the last emperor, Constantine XI Palaiologos. The history of the Byzantine Empire is a fascinating series of events, often treated by Western Europeans as marginal to the events of Catholic Christendom and consequently less known outside medievalist circles than, say, the history of England or the Papacy. However, the Byzantine Empire was its own centre and a looming entity in the history of the Near East.
There has always been a fascination with Byzantium in the Western mind, treated often as something alien, wildly different. One man who was very intrigued by the strangeness and mystery of the Byzantine Empire was William Butler Yeats, whose two poems on Byzantium evokes the sort of romantic mystification that has clouded more than explained the nature of the Empire and its history. These are both beautiful poems, and for this occasion I will present my favourite of the two - Sailing to Byzantium - together with my own translation into Norwegian. The translation will be followed by a literal rendition so as to show just in what ways I have twisted the original text in order to maintain the meaning, and what compromises the translation has required.
,+Mandeville.jpg)
The City of Constantinople as described by John Mandeville,
From
MS. Harley 3954, 15thC (East Anglia)
Courtesy of British Library
Sailing to Byzantium
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another’s arms, birds in the trees
– Those dying generations – at their song,
The salmon‐falls, the mackerel‐crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.
O sages standing in God’s holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing‐masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees
—Those dying generations—at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.
O sages standing in God's holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come. - See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20310#sthash.OAEavJht.dpuf
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees
—Those dying generations—at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.
O sages standing in God's holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come. - See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20310#sthash.OAEavJht.dpuf
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees
—Those dying generations—at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.
O sages standing in God's holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come. - See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20310#sthash.OAEavJht.dpuf
That is no country for old men. The young
In one another's arms, birds in the trees
—Those dying generations—at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.
An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.
O sages standing in God's holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come. - See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20310#sthash.OAEavJht.dpuf
Philosophers in Macedonia and tournaments in Constantinople,
From
MS. Harley 3954, 15thC (East Anglia)
Courtesy of British Library
Å segle til Bysants
Dét er ikkje eit land for gamle menn.
Dei
unge, arm i arm, fuglane i tre
– forgjengelege ættledd – i deira
lei,
til song, kvar sølvsprengd sjø, kvart
elvekre,
fugl, fisk og fe i ei stor sommar-rei
gjev pris til fødd, til skapt og
døyande.
Av desse tonar fanga, kvar ei slekt
vil gløyme alt om tidlaust intellekt.
Ein kall er helst ein ubetydeleg ting,
ein rivna frakk
oppå ein staur, so sant
då ikkje sjela klappar høgt og syng
for kvar ei kjøtleg rift i baug og
spant.
Dei lærer ikkje song, men ser
ikring
sin stordoms reisverk bygd på kvar ein kant;
og derfor
seglar eg og søkjer glans
i keisaren sin helga by: Bysants.
De
prestar som står i Guds helga loge
som mosaikken i ein gullgjord
mur,
kom frå den helga logen, piler frå bogen,
og lær mi
sjel å meistre moll og dur.
Kom et mitt hjarta opp; sjukleg av
hugen
og bunde til eit døyand' kreatur,
det
veit'kje kva det er; lat meg ta del
i den store æva sitt
narrespel.
Når naturen slepp meg vil eg ikkje ta
min kropp
frå noko som naturen hev,
men frå emalje, gull so tynt som
blad,
ja slikt dei greske gullsmedane gjev
ein keisar som vil
ut av svevnen dra;
ell' som vert sett på gullkvist og der
kved
til vyrde menn og kvinner i Bysants
om kva som kjem, som
er og eingong fanst.
Psellos and his pupil the Emperor, Byzantine mosaic c.800
Courtesy of Wikimedia
To Sail to Byzantium
That is not a country for old men. The
Young, arm in arm, the birds in trees,
- Those transient generations - in their direction
To song each silver-laden sea, each river-trout,
Fowl, fish and livestock in one big summer-throng
Give praises to the born, the created and the dying.
By these tones made captive, each family
Will forget all about timeless intellect.
And old man is rather an unimportant thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
The soul don't loudly clap and sing
For each a fleshly wound in prow and frame.
They do not learn song, but see around
The structures of their greatness on every side
And therefore I sail to seek splendour
In the emperor's hallowed city: Byzantium.
You priests who stand in God's hallowed fire,
As the mosaic of a golden wall,
Come from the hallowed fire, arrows from the bow,
And teach my soul to master majors and minors.
Come eat up my heart; sickened by the will
And fastened to a dying creature
It knows not what it is; and let me take part
In the great deception of eternity.
When nature releases me I will not take
My body from anything that nature has,
But from enamel, gold as thin as leaves,
Yes such the Grecian goldsmiths will give
An emperor who wants to depart from sleep;
Or which is set upon a golden bough and there chants
To high-born men and women of Byzantium
Of what will come, what is and what once was.
Byzantine mosaic allegedly depicting the soul in the body and outside the body
Courtesy of Wikimedia
