Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant: Household EditionBryant, William Cullen
General
Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant: Household Edition
Bryant, William Cullen
Poetry
The verses of the Spanish poet here translated refer to the "woman who
had been a sinner," mentioned in the seventh chapter of St. Luke's
Gospel, and who is commonly confounded with Mary Magdalen.
Page 142.
FATIMA AND RADUAN.
This and the following poems belong to that class of ancient Spanish
ballads, by unknown authors, called _Romances Moriscos_--Moriscan
Romances or ballads. They were composed in the fourteenth century, some
of them, probably, by the Moors, who then lived intermingled with the
Christians; and they relate the loves and achievements of the knights of
Granada.
Page 143.
LOVE AND FOLLY.--(FROM LA FONTAINE.)
This is rather an imitation than a translation of the poem of the
graceful French fabulist.
Page 146.
_These eyes shall not recall thee_, etc.
This is the very expression of the original--_No te llamarán mis ojos,
_etc. The Spanish poets early adopted the practice of calling a lady by
the name of the most expressive feature of her countenance, her eyes.
The lover styled his mistress "ojos bellos," beautiful eyes; "ojos
serenos," serene eyes. Green eyes seem to have been anciently thought a
great beauty in Spain, and there is a very pretty ballad by an absent
lover, in which he addressed his lady by the title of "green eyes;"
supplicating that he may remain in her remembrance:
"¡Ay ojuelos verdes!
Ay los mis ojuelos!
Ay, hagan los cielos
Que de mi te acuerdes!"
Page 147.
_Say, Love--for didst thou see her tears_, etc.
The stanza beginning with this line stands thus in the original:
"Dilo tu, amor, si lo viste;
¡Mas ay! que de lastimado
Diste otro nudo a la venda,
Para no ver lo que la pasado."
I am sorry to find so poor a conceit deforming so spirited a composition
as this old ballad, but I have preserved it in the version. It is one of
those extravagances which afterward became so common in Spanish poetry,
when Gongora introduced the _estilo culto_, as it was called.
Page 148.
LOVE IN THE AGE OF CHIVALRY.
This personification of the passion of Love, by Peyre Vidal, has been
referred to as a proof of how little the Provençal poets were indebted
to the authors of Greece and Rome for the imagery of their poems.
Page 149.
THE LOVE OF GOD.--(FROM THE PROVENÇAL OF BERNARD RASCAS.)
The original of these lines is thus given by John of Nostradamus, in his
Lives of the Troubadours, in a barbarous Frenchified orthography:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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