Week three- A Study Of Sappho

Ok so in poetry society last week we were looking at haikus, and now we are going to look at a poet from the Classical world who practised a similar economy with language: Sappho (630-570BC). I myself had never heard of her until this week, probably because only 650 of the 10,000 lines she wrote have survived the ravages of time. So I proceeded to do a bit of research.

A Greek poet from the island of Lesbos, Sappho wrote mainly lyric poetry, and she is best known for her poems about love. Outside of the academic circles she is perhaps best known as a symbol of same sex desire, and her island home has given its name to just this kind of thing. But back to poetry.

In spite, or because, of its fragmentary form (having literally disintegrated in many cases) - and because of the various ways in which it can be translated into modern English - Sappho's poetry appeals to modernists who like to interpret imagery. Take the following example from Hymn to Aphrodite-

With chariot yoked to thy fleet-winged coursers,
Fluttering swift pinions over earth's darkness,
And bringing thee through the infinite, gliding
Downwards from heaven,
Then, soon they arrived and thou, blessed goddess,
With divine contenance smiling, didst ask me
What new woe had befallen me now and why,
Thus I had called thee.
As you can see her style is beautiful, especially since she uses so many metaphors, and her adjectives really flow together to create a wonderful image of the goddess Aphrodite. I don't know if anyone has noticed that I have been blogging about mainly female poets, being a bit of a feminist myself - along with everyone else in poet soc - which is surely very positive! Sappho shows that women were successful writers long before Aphrodite Behn became the first professional female writer in the 17th Century. Here is an excerpt from The Stars About The Full Moon-

The gleaming stars all about the shining moon
Hide their bright faces, when full-orbed and splendid
In the sky she floats, flooding the shadowed earth
with clear silver light.
This is a prime example of her skills in description, and her use of personification with the moon. I really enjoy reading her poetry because she totally captivates her reader and her use of objective correlative contributes to this. Every poem fragment is interlaced with an emotion-passion, serenity, contnentment, wonder, and desire. To me, she is a very influential poet and I can't wait to try to write some similarly styled poems next week. I certainly learned something new today and I hope you did to.

A.H🐝