Greek Lyric: Sappho and Alcaeus

The main interest in Loeb Classical Library's Greek Lyric I is Sappho. Identified with the city of Mytilene, on the isle of Lesbos, ca. 7th - 6th centuries B.C., Sappho exemplified, for the ancient Greek and Roman critics (e.g., Ovid, Catullus, Longinus, Plutarch), consummate skill in the craft of poetry--especially with her ability to deploy the Greek language (within the ancient Aeolic dialect) for the most subtle musical/meterical effects and thrilling invocations. Her peers are only the greatest of love poets. What Aristotle says of Sophocles applies equally to Sappho: She has only to name the nightingale and she sings. With one exception, her poetry exists for us only in the briefest of quotations, often no more than half a line here, half a word there-- but these are sufficient to document her greatness. It were worth studying Greek so as to enjoy her very words. The translation is fairly literal, but do read the Greek text aloud and thereby relish the compression of her language and the music of her song (ah, the genius of ancient Greek-- so seductive that the rabbis of old forbade the study of Greek until the scholar had attained the years of prudence, i.e., 40+). Essential to any library for gentle-folk. Let me add that at least three great achievements in poetry come to us from the eastern Mediterranean--Homer, Sappho, and King David. The poetry of these three wordsmiths is, first, to be sung, or incanted, with instrumental acompaniment. And, while translations are often splendid (especially with Psalms, or Tehillim), yet each poet bends the words to his/her will (to paraphrase Luther's appreciation of J Des Prez).