SPECTATOR COMPETITION No. 165

Report by Maecenas Readers were invited to submit a translation of Catullus's poem beginning " Ille mi par esse deo videtur " in the style of any one of the following poets : John Donne, Robert Burns, Lord Byron, Coventry Patmore, Lord Tennyson, A. E. Housman, T. S. Eliot, Dylan Thomas. There were three main hurdles in this competition, and few entrants survived them all. The first two were the normal ones of style and translation ; the bulk of the field had either the one or the other, but seldom both. Arising from these was the far more difficult problem of thinking oneself into a chosen poet's mind when confronted with a given situation. It is easy enough to produce pastiche or parody, in a general way, of an English poet ; it is not over-hard to produce a workmanlike translation of a Latin one. The real test is to work out how the English poet would react to the emotional situation of the Roman, and discipline the result into something still recognisable, within wide boundaries, as a translation.

All poets set were attempted ; but surprisingly Housman headed the poll, and most attempts failed from the start by attributing a most inappropriate warmth of passion to him. Housman never addressed anyone as " my sweet " ; and on the lowest level it takes more than a generous sprinkling of " lads " to make even a passable parody. Charles Race very nearly brought off a prize, but dropped out through a %Veak last stanza ; his first catches the Professor's Osissima verba :

The lad that sits besides you, And gazes long and long,

And hears your lovely laughter—

He has no peer among The highest of Jove's throng.

Patmore and Tennyson produced few attempts, none of them wholly satisfactory. C. P. Driver came near to Patmore at one point With " The laughter of my Very Dear " ; A. B.'s Housman version would have been considered if submitted as Tennyson. The Laureate's decorous passion was fully caught once only, by Miss D. F. Bushell, in a pair of lines from a new Locksley Hall :

But alas 1 my senses fail me ! But alas, my woeful plight ! Looking on thee, words to woo thee, Lesbia have left me quite.

The moderns are apparently hard to imitate ; T. S. Eliot and Dylan Thomas produced the most uniformly disappointing entries. With rare exceptions they caught neither translator nor original. Sheila Knowles dealt prettily with Mr. Eliot's hesitant caveats :

Who is facing you seems high in heaven He seems and does not seem highest in heaven (Though speaking for myself, I should have rejected The hyperbole there, the hint towards blasphemy ...)

and Canis Junior produced a brilliant pastiche of Dylan Thomas which, however, only occasionally (" Here is my tongue slain low and the fire crawling/Tide slow in a fuse of limbs ") approximated to its original. The Burns contingent, with one notable exception, failed to take full advantage of the powerful Doric vocabulary of passion bequeathed them by their prototype, despite occasional flashes, such as S. MacNeill. Campbell's " I gang fair tapsalteerie " ; and in the end it was Donne (as might be expected) and Byron (rather surprisingly) who carried off the prizes. I award £3 to Kenneth S. Kitchin for an effort that triumphantly surmounted all my hurdles ; £2 to Cynthia Janus for a charming tour de force out of Don Juan ; and a Highly Commended to M. Stanier. Also commended : P. M., Sheila Knowles and Charles Race. -- PRIZES

(KENNETH S. KITCHIN)

In the Manner of Donne Hee is Gods Peeve, nay, hee has all Gods beate (If this without Prophanitie may be soe)

Who beholds thee, and hears thy laughter sweete, Yet keeps his Seate : I, poor Wretch, cannot do't ; it nothings,,mee, And snatches from mee each sense that I owe For when, my Lesbia, mine eye-beams catch thee, My voice doth flee :

My tonguestrings drie up, down through each lanke limme Of this Anatomie Love's flame cloth goe, My tinkling Eaves do in their own sound swimme, My twin lights dimme.

Spare houres, Catullus, thy Soules Ambush grow ; In spare houres thy Joy, phrenzied, doth o'erflow. Spare houres, Kings ere now, and blest Citties too, Did overthrow.

(CYNTHIA JANUS)

Two stanzas apparently rejected from " Don Juan " (It is to be feared that his Lordship has rather missed the spirit of the orginal, but what translator does not ?) . . . Though deep theology I can't illumine,

Catullus' fancy much with mine agrees, That in a state surpassing all that's human Is he (not I, God help me) who in vis A vis with such a laughing lovely woman

As one I've known, sits, gazes at his ease,

And—what ?—why, as the poet put it, sits ;

A thing that quite annihilates my wits.

One glance—a kind of mute paralysis Stifles my speech ; a sudden feverish glow Spreads through my veins ; my ears ring symphonies Of bells ; my vision's blotted out—and so I tell myself this nerveless dalliance is The worst thing for me ; it's a curse, we know, And has (no doubt) undone a host of kings, Thrones, principalities, and such-like things.

HIGHLY COMMENDED

(M. STANIER)

After Burns Tae see thy sweetly smiling face Is (Heeven forgie me) taste o' Heeven, And wha attends thy angel grace Must walk sublime among the leevin'.

But ah I the donnert loon that's me, Thy very voice o' sense strips bare.

Sae soon I cast my sicht on thee, I can nae mair, I can nae mair.

But deid's my tongue and through my marrow There rins a flame ; I canna whecsht The dirl that stabs my eardrums thorough. My e'en are blinded wi' a mist.

The truth is, Rab, ye're fashed wi' leesure.

Ye're unco hot, my paughty mon.

But kings hae choked themselves on pleesure, An' Babylon, an Babylon.