Poems Page 24
As I worked on these translations, I was fortunate to receive assistance from some of the foremost Propertius scholars in the UK. Not having spent my life as a professional Latinist, I thought it advisable to follow a single edition. I have essentially been guided by the 2007 Oxford Classical Text edited by Stephen Heyworth, Bowra Fellow in Classics at Wadham College, Oxford. I believe mine is the first full English verse translation to take advantage of his edition, as well as his monumental commentary, Cynthia. Professor Heyworth has also discussed with me some points of detail on the text. He and Tristan Franklinos, Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, also took time out from busy schedules to check through and correct my notes. For whatever faults remain in them, I am solely responsible. Peter Heslin, Professor of Classics at Durham University, kindly wrote the introduction to this volume and has also, in correspondence, illuminated a number of aspects of the poet’s work.
My friend the Carcanet poet Jeffrey Wainwright, like me a part-time resident in Propertius’ home region of Umbria (where many of these translations were done), has provided valuable help and advice over a period of years.
A special place goes to Ezra Pound’s daughter, Mary de Rachewiltz, who entertained me to tea at her castle in the South Tyrol and enlightened me on her father’s approach to translation. Her Italian version of a selection of Pound’s work, done in consultation with him, includes one of the Homage poems.
Others who gave me comment and encouragement after reading some of the poems include: Cathie Alexander, Susan Armstrong, Ian Cathrow, Alison Finch, Pamela Gagliani, Ann Jefferson, Marcia McKean, Frances Reader, Bill Ross, Rona Skene, Janice Viarnaud, Ouida Weaver, Susan Weil and the late Mike Bygrave.
My greatest debt is to my wife, Tricia, to whom this book is dedicated, and our son Alex, who both urged me from the outset to pursue what must have seemed at first like an improbable enterprise.
Viepri, Italy, 2006 – Cambridge, England, 2018
About the Author
SEXTUS PROPERTIUS (c. 55 – 15 BC) was an elegiac poet of the Augustan age, born and raised in Umbria. Little biographical detail survives beyond what can be inferred from his poems. He published his first book of verse around 30 BC, and at least three more in his lifetime. He was in the circle of the influential patron of the arts Maecenas. A successor of Catullus and rough contemporary of Vergil, Ovid and Horace, he is perhaps best known today through Ezra Pound’s experimental ‘homage’ of 1919.
After reading Classics and Modern Languages at Merton College, Oxford, PATRICK WORSNIP worked for more than forty years as a correspondent and editor for Reuters news agency, with postings in Italy, Russia, Poland, Iran, Lebanon, the US and the UK. Since retiring in 2012, he has devoted himself to translation from Italian and Latin, and to magazine articles on Italian poetry. He divides his time between Cambridge and Umbria, Italy. He is married, with one son.
Copyright
Every effort has been made by the publisher to reproduce the formatting of the original print edition in electronic format. However, poem formatting may change according to reading device and font size.
First published in Great Britain in 2018 by Carcanet Press Ltd, Alliance House, 30 Cross Street, Manchester M2 7AQ.
This eBook edition first published in 2018.
Poems, notes and afterword © Patrick Worsnip, 2018. Introduction © Peter Heslin, 2018. The right of Patrick Worsnip to be identified as the editor of this work and author of its translations, notes and afterword, and the right of Peter Heslin to be identified as the author of its introduction, has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988. All rights reserved.
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The publisher acknowledges financial assistance from Arts Council England.