Of Dames, of Knights, of armes, of loves delight
Posted on 23 January 2012
Not long ago, I read to my boys, A PRINCESS OF MARS by Edgar Rice Burroughs. I have been told by trusty friends that, like eating the fair unearthly fruit of the perilous realm where the Elfqueen reigns, once a muggle has supped on the viands of geekdom, there is no returning to the mundane world unchanged.
Well, a geekery ever geeker has occured. At their instigation, not of mine, my children wishing to know the tale of whom my middle boy Roland is named, insisted I read to them ORLANDO FURIOSO.
Of course I read from the John Harington translation, which he penned while in exile from the court of Queen Elizabeth, and which, along with the work of Shakespeare and Spencer, helped add the vanish of gilt to the golden age over which the Virgin Queen reigned (once all statues of the Virgin Mary were toppled.)
Naturally, I had to pause to explain every sentence what the Yodi-like contracutions and archaisms meant. But I also had to stop every paragraph to explain the Victorianisms of PRINCESS OF MARS to them, so it was much the same. As often before, I note that the so-called archaic English is note merely fairer and more dignified, but surprisingly more serviceable and precise than our own. I was frankly baffled how to render into clumsy modern idiom the exact meaning of
You see the faire Angelica is gone,
So soon we lose that earst we fought so sore.
– without saying a line of twice the length.
You see the white and beautiful Angelica is gone,
for we rather quickly have lost the prize for which we were at first so desperately and with such pain formerly battling.
So, now my boys have stepped beyond even the stars and alien worlds, dark towers and magic rings of science fiction and fairyland, and touched the golden thread of epic, that winds back through all literature and lore unto prehistory, the very vein running straight from the ring finger of Mankind to his mysterious heart!
Even the science fiction crowd will find them odd. My mission as a father is not in vain!
My boys are sophisticated enough that when I describe Angelica the Fair as “the MacGuffin” my eldest objected that she must be “the love interest” since she was a character and not a prop. I challenged him to retain that opinion after I had read the first Book. All the Knights, Christian and Spanish both, chase her like foxes after a bunny, and none gives a tuppence or a tinker’s damn for her wishes in anything.
ORLANDO FURIOSO
by Lodovico Ariosto
translated by John Harington
1532
-1-
Of Dames, of Knights, of armes, of loves delight,
Of courtesies, of high attempts I speake,
Then when the Moores transported all their might
On Africke seas, the force of France to breake:
Incited by the youthfull heate and spight
Of Agramant their King, that vow’d to wreake
The death of King Trayano (lately slaine)
Upon the Romane Emperour Charlemaine.
-2-
I will no lesse Orlandos acts declare,
(A tale in prose ne verse yet sung or said)
Who fell bestraught with love, a hap most rare,
To one that erst was counted wise and stayd:
If my sweet Saint that causeth my like care,
My slender muse affoord some gracious ayd,
I make no doubt but I shall have the skill.
As much as I have promist to fulfill.
[...]
-5-
Orlando who long time had loved deare,
Angelica the faire: and for her sake,
About the world, in nations far and neare,
Did high attempts performe and undertake,
Return’d with her into the West that yeare,
That Charles his power against the Turks did make:
And with the force of Germanie and France,
Neare Pyren Alpes his standard did advance.
-6-
To make the Kings of Affrike and of Spaine,
Repent their rash attempts and foolish vaunts;
One having brought from Affrike in his traine,
All able men to carry sword or launce,
The other mov’d the Spaniards now again
To overthrow the goodly Realme of Fraunce….
Orlando in Madness
Congratulations on the excellent taste of your sons! I am delighted that they want more of the high, the noble, the fair and the excellent
So, maybe some Spenser after your done with Orlando’s adventures? Might I suggest that you don’t use A.C. Hamilton’s critical edition. The thing is a phone book, containing practically every scrap of criticism or analysis ever penned on the poem.
And if I might try my hand at the lines you picked…
You see the luminous Angelica is gone,
so bitterly fought for and so quickly lost
One of the things that I found helpful in going through the classics was listening to them as audio books. With a good narrator that doesn’t just speak things out, you get cadence, rhythm, intonation, and emotion that really submerge you into the text.
When are you going to introduce your children to The Incompleat Enchanter?
How about
So quickly we have lost lovely Angelica,
for whom we fought so hard and took such wounds.
But perhaps “So soon we lose that” in the second line is intended to be a more general observation, of which Angelica is only one example; then maybe
Lovely Angelica is gone; so it goes!
What’s hard won is often easy lost.
You are cleverer than I in coming up with a short way to say it, but I still give kudos to the Elizabethans for having such convenient words as ‘erst’ and ‘hap.’
By hap their tongue was erst more fair.
At the age of 10, I played hooky and hide in my parents’ basement all day long to read The Princess of Mars. A day well spent. For years they were my favorite books of all time. Imagine my disappointment when I discovered that the lengthy Tarzan series did not hold up to the glories of Barsoom.
It is a delight to meet a fellow Barsoomianite. KAOR!
I was trying to read THUVIA, MAID OF MARS to my children last night, but my youngest wants to skip directly to CHESSSMAN. He will give me no reason for his offense with this book: perhaps because it stars Carthoris and not John Carter.
Chessmen of Mars is one of my favorites. Ghek the Kaldane overstimulated my imagination as a pre-teen.
As an honorary Houyhnhnm, of course I have the greatest possible respect for Kaldanes! We are a cousin species, so to speak.
Well, we can guess about the lead character possibility if you go for Chessmen, since he’s not the lead there either.
That reminds me that I have to get through Boiardo and Ariosto some time. Incidentally, my father’s family are from Ferrara, and according to my father, my grandfather was born in Ariosto’s own house!
I have no taste for Boiardo, but Ariosto (at least in translations I have read) has a wit and a relish and also touches of piety and tragedy which speak well for his powers as a poet.