Return to the index of "Other Women's Voices."
Updated 10-03-08
Sappho (c.600 BCE)
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"SOMEONE WILL REMEMBER US... EVEN IN ANOTHER TIME."
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Sappho was born in the late 700s BCE on Lesbos, one of the larger islands in the Aegean, near Lydia (now Turkey). Lesbos was important for trade between mainland Greece and the kingdoms of Asia; it was also a cultural center. Sappho was probably from an aristocratic family of the city of Mytiline; she probably married and had at least one daughter. She may have spent some time in exile in Sicily.
Her poetry suggests that she was the center of a closely-knit group of women; we don't know if this was some kind of an academy or a chorus of singers. We do know that Sappho composed epithalamia (marriage songs) for performance by a group. But her preferred form seems to have been songs to be sung or recited by an individual to the accompaniment of a lyre, some perhaps for religious or civic festivals.
Almost 200 fragments of Sappho's poetry are extant, but many of these are only a word or a few words. One poem, usually called the "Hymn to Aphrodite," may be complete, but we aren't sure. Even from fragments we can tell that Sappho had the ability to look at herself and others clearly --- often ironically --- and the ability to make us hear her voice.
On this page you'll find:
Links to helpful sites online.
Excerpts from translations in print.
Information about secondary sources.
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1. Many translations of Sappho are online; there is some repetition, but there are also alternative versions of the same poem:
(a) Links to all of the known fragments attributed to Sappho, translated by Edwin Marion Cox (1925). You are given the transliterated Greek, a literal translation (sometimes a verse translation as well), and a description of the commentary or other context in which the fragment was found.
(b) At this site you'll find Henry Thornton Wharton's large 1880s collection of Sappho translations, but you'll also find much more: links to other translations, to essays, and to illustrations of papyri and Sappho paintings.
(c) Links to 46 poems, from various translators.
(d) Links to about 30 poems, translated by Mary Barnard. (And elsewhere, a four-page 1999 re-evaluation of Barnard's 1958 Sappho, by Walter G. Englert III.)
(e) Thirteen poems and several brief fragments, translated by A.S. Kline.
(f) After excerpts from a 1996 article on Sappho by Andre Lardinois, twelve fragments translated by David A. Campbell.
(g) Use your browser's search function to go to the second use of "Sappho" for 10 poems made of 12 fragments, translated by George Theodoridis.
(h) Twenty-three English translations and adaptations of a single Sappho poem, "'He seems to me equal to gods," from Sir Phillip Sidney's in the 1500s to Anne Carson's in 2002; these follow two versions in romanized Greek, Catullus' Latin version, and two French translations.
(i) At another site, Josephine Balmer's version of the above, "It seems to me that man is equal to the gods" (it is followed by five that are also given above).
(j) Links to seven "Sapphic Shards" (3 given at "Fragments on Eros") translated by Peter Saint-Andre.
(k) Six fragments, translated by Anne Carson.
(l) Links to six translations (including one, "Song of the Rose," by Elizabeth Barrett Browning) from an 1893 collection.
(m) After an essay by Alix North, six poems, by various translators.
(n) Five poems, translated by Willis Barnstone; and elsewhere, another, "Now when I look at you a moment."
(o) Three of Sappho's poems, translated by Rexroth; Sappho is the second poet given.
(p) Three poems and 22 fragments, translated by Julia Dubnoff.
(q) Five versions of a single poem, "The moon has set, and the Pleiades," from Guy Davenport, Sam Hamill, Rexroth, Barnard, and Carson.
(r) Two translations by Jim Powell: "That country girl has witched your wishes," and "Some say thronging cavalry."
(s) An "almost complete" poem discovered in 2004 (although some lines had been known before), translated and discussed by Martin West, "[You for] the fragrant-blossomed [Muses'] lovely gifts"; the Greek original is also given. At another site, scholars' discussion of West's translation and three other versions of the same poem. (For yet another version, see under "In print.")
2. Essays, etc:
(a) Sappho is the focus of Mark Damen's 2004 essay on the "lyric age" of Greek poetry; Damen shows how her poems differ from those of the earlier epic.
(b) "Sappho of Lesbos" (2004), by Christina A. Clark, on the poet's versatility, includes several quotations in Clark's own translation.
(c) Anita George's seven-page entry on Sappho (2002) in the Encyclopedia of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Culture; it includes several translations by George.
(d) "Decreation: How Women Like Sappho, Marguerite Porete, and Simone Weil Tell God" (2002), by Anne Carson, discusses the contradiction involved in each writer's denying herself in the very act of writing about herself; Carson gives her translation of two of Sappho's poems.
(e) "Sappho and her Wedding Songs," a four-part 1997 essay by Jennifer Powers, which discusses the epithalamia and gives translations by Paul Roche and by Jim Powell (no notes are given, so you will need to link to the bibliography for sources).
(f) "Sappho and the World of Lesbian Poetry" (1996/2005), by William Harris, which gives a detailed interpretation of the "Hymn to Aphrodite" and briefer comments on other poems and line fragments, emphasizing the poems' visual images. You can also download a PDF file that develops the points made in the article and provides illustrations as well as the Greek text.
(g) Two chapters from Margaret Williamson's 1995 study, Sappho's Immortal Daughters, which discuss the poems in the light of the social and political background and of attitudes toward sexuality; quotes from Sappho are given in Williamson's translation.
(h) Holt Parker's 1993 essay, "Sappho Schoolmistress," which reviews how critics have read and misread Sappho's poems (for information on a 2005 essay by Parker, see under "Secondary sources").
(i) A three-part 2000 conversation on Sappho, giving the views of novelist Peter Green and Sappho scholar Margaret Reynolds.
(j) Kenneth Rexroth's thoughts on Sappho, from his 1968 collection of essays, Classics Revisited.
3. Reviews (for excerpts from the translations, see "In print"; for information on the other books' treatment of Sappho, see "Secondary sources"):
(a) Jessica Priestley on Powell's 2007 translation, The Poetry of Sappho.
(b) Heather A. O'Neill on Willis Barnstone's 2006 translation, Sweetbitter Love: Poems of Sappho.
(c) John D'Agata on Anne Carson's 2002 translation, If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho; D'Agata compares Carson's versions with those of other translators. Elsewhere, another review, by Barry McKinnon, which focuses on the poems' "broken text."
(d) Judith de Luce on Snyder's 1991 translation, The Woman and the Lyre: Women Writers in Classical Greece and Rome.
(e) Jena Woodhouse on Marguerite Johnson's 2007 study, Sappho.
(f) Simone Viarre on the 2005 essay collection, Women Poets in Ancient Greece and Rome
(g) Meryl Altman on Reynolds' 2003 study, The Sappho History (as well as on Carson's translation and a novel by Erica Jong).
(h) Barbara Goff on the 2002 collection, Among Women: From the Homosocial to the Homoerotic in the Ancient World.
(i) Tim Whitmarsh on the 2002 collection, Making Silence Speak: Women's Voices in Greek Literature and Society
(j) Laura Miller on Reynolds' 2000 study, The Sappho Companion.
(k) Ellen Greene on Williamson's 1995 Sappho's Immortal Daughters.
4. Twenty-seven illustrations showing the treatment of the legend of Sappho over the centuries (note the two earliest, from c.450 BCE).
5. Tom Hefko's collection of links will take you to some of the sites given above and to others. Hefco also gives a 2003 bibliography of English translations.
6. For historical background, Laura McClure's introduction
to the 2001 essay collection, Making
Silence Speak; McClure describes both ancient views and
recent studies of women as speakers in classical Greece.
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[This latest collection of the longtime Sappho translator Willis Barnstone is a useful one. It contains not only all of the known (and attributed) lines from Sappho, but also the original sources of the fragments (and often Barnstone's commentary on them). The book provides a useful glossary and bibliography. The translations do not indicate omissions (as do Anne Carson's, below) but the Greek originals given on the facing pages do. For readers of the originals, William E. McCulloh provides an epilogue and metrical guide. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Sweetbitter love: poems of Sappho / translated by Willis Barnstone;
with epilogue and metrical guide by William E. McCulloh. Boston:
Shambhala; [New York]: Distributed by Random House, 2006. (xlix,
316 p.)
LC#: PA4408.E5 B35 2006; ISBN: 1590301757
Includes bibliographical references (p. 310-314) and index
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"I shall always be a virgin untamed."
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[Barnstone includes several poems originally attributed to Alcaeus but now assigned to Sappho by some modern scholars. This is one. (Artemis, with her twin Phoebus Apollo, were the children of Leto, Koios' daughter.):]
Gold-haired Phoebus borne by Koios's daughter
after she joined with Kronos's son Zeus god of high clouds and
high name.
Artemis swore the great oath of the gods to Zeus:
"By your head, I shall always be a virgin
untamed, hunting on peaks of solitary mountains.
Come, grant me this grace!"
So she spoke. Then the father of the blessed gods
nodded his consent. Now gods and mortals
call her by her thrilling eponym, The Virgin Deer Hunter.
Eros, loosener of limbs, never comes near her [p.
23]
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"Time spins away."
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[And he includes one that, long attributed to Sappho, is now questioned; Barnstone finds it "quintessential Sappho" (p. 281):]
The moon has set and
the Pleiades, Middle
of the night, time spins
away and I lie alone. [p.
75]
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"What can I do?"
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[One poem in the book is jointly translated by Barnstone and McCulloh: it is the one most recently found in a 200s BCE papyrus and published in 2004. (The goddess Dawn asked Zeus to give her beloved Tithonus the gift of eternal life, but she neglected to ask that he be also given eternal youth.):]
Those lovely gifts of the fragrant-breasted Muses,
girls, seek them eagerly in thrilling song of the lyre.
Old age has grasped my earlier delicate skin
and my black hair has become white,
my spirit turned heavy, my knees no longer
carry me nimble for dancing like a fawn.
About these things I groan. What can I do?
For a human not to grow old is impossible.
They say Dawn, dazzled by love, took Tithonus
in her rose arms to the utter end of the earth.
Once beautiful and young, time seized him
into gray old age, husband of a deathless wife. [p.197]
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[Jim Powell's translation is followed by a brief but useful essay, "The Text of Sappho's Poems" that describes the finding of new poems since the 1890s and concludes with the "plausible prospect of more new recoveries." (See the book's table of contents online.):]
The poetry of Sappho / translation and notes by Jim Powell.
Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2007. (53 p.; 18 cm.)
LC#: PA4408.E5 P69 2007; ISBN: 9780195326710, 9780195326727
Includes bibliographical references (p. 49).
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"I grumble at them often but...."
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[Powell's version of the nearly complete poem discovered in 2004 (compare it with the versions given online and just above):]
The violet-lapped Muses' lovely gifts belong
to you now, children, and the piercing lyre, the friend of song.
My body, that before, was supple, age already
has taken by surprise, my raven tresses are turned white,
my spirit has grown heavy and my knees too weak
to carry me, that once were quick to dance as fauns.
I grumble at them often but what good is that?
For human beings to be ageless is not possible.
They say that once, for love, Dawn of the rosy arms
carried Tithonus aboard her golden bowl to the world's end
when young and handsome, but all the same in time gray age
caught up with him, although his wife was an immortal goddess.
[pp.19-20]
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"...around the lovely altar."
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[Powell also includes several poems which have been attributed both to Sappho and to her contemporary, Alcaeus; Powell assigns them to Sappho. Here is one:]
Cretan women once danced this way
on gentle feet in time
around the lovely altar, softly
treading the tender flowers of grass. [p.41]
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[Anne Carson has translated all of Sappho's known fragments,
including individual words, and gives the original Greek on the
facing page. Carson's brief introduction explains her method
and goal; her notes are valuable (no superscript leads you to
them) and frequently witty:]
If not, winter: fragments of Sappho / translated by Anne Carson.
New York: Alfred A. Knopf: Distributed by Random House, 2002.
(xiii, 397 p.)
LC#: PA4408.E5 C37 2002; ISBN: 0375410678
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"Sing to us."
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[In both the Greek originals and in her translations, Carson uses brackets to indicate missing or illegible material. For Carson, "brackets are exciting" (p.xi), and in fact they do invite the reader to fill in the blanks more strongly than does the use of ellipses:]
]
]
] pity
] trembling
]
] flesh by now old age
] covers
] flies in pursuit
]
] noble
] taking
] sing to us
the one with violets in her lap
] mostly
] goes astray [#21;
p.39]
[And another example of the effect of brackets:]
]
] nor
] desire
] but all at once
] blossom
] desire
] took delight [#78;
p.153]
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"Whom should I persuade (now again)...?"
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[The one Sappho poem that may be complete; you can compare Carson's translation to those found online:]
Deathless Aphrodite of the spangled mind,
child of Zeus,who twist lures, I beg you
do not break with hard pains,
O lady, my heart
but come here if ever before
you caught my voice far off
and listening left your father's
golden house and came,
yoking your car. And fine birds brought you,
quick sparrows over the black earth
whipping their wings down the sky
through midair---
they arrived. But you, O blessed one,
smiled in your deathless face
and asked what (now again) I have suffered and why
(now again) I am calling out
and what I want to happen most of all
in my crazy heart. Whom should I persuade (now again)
to lead you back into her love? Who, O
Sappho, is wronging you?
For if she flees, soon she will pursue.
If she refuses gifts, rather will she give them.
If she does not love, soon she will love
even unwilling.
Come to me now: loose me from hard
care and all my heart longs
to accomplish, accomplish. You
be my ally. [#1;
pp.3-5]
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"Cold sweat holds me and shaking grips me."
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[Quoted by Longinus (including the unfinished last line), as an example of sublimity in its description of bodily sensation:]
He seems to me equal to gods that man
whoever he is who opposite you
sits and listens close
to your sweet speaking
and lovely laughing---oh it
puts the heart in my chest on wings
for when I look at you, even a moment, no speaking
is left in me
no: tongue breaks and thin
fire is racing under skin
and in eyes no sight and drumming
fills ears
and cold sweat holds me and shaking
grips me all, greener than grass
I am and dead---or almost
I seem to me.
But all is to be dared, because even a person of poverty [#31; p.63]
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"Two states of mind in me."
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[Other lines found in ancient sources:]
you came and I was crazy for you
and you cooled my mind that burned with longing [#48;
p.101]
I don't know what to do
two states of mind in me [#51;
p.107]
someone will remember us
I say
even in another time [#147;
p.297]
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[In addition to translating 40 of Sappho's fragments, Jane
McIntosh Snyder has translated all of the Greek and classical
Latin women poets and selections from the Latin prose writers.
Snyder gives a detailed analysis of each poem, including a description
of the sounds of the originals, valuable for the Greek-less reader:]
Snyder, Jane McIntosh. The woman and the lyre: women writers
in Classical Greece and Rome. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University
Press,1991. (xiii,199p.)
LC#: PA3067 .S69 1991; ISBN: 0809317060
Previously published: Bristol: Bristol Classical Press; Carbondale,
IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1989. Includes bibliographical
references and index.
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"I say it is what one loves."
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[Ellipses indicate missing words; the parentheses are the translator's conjectures. The "Cyprian" is the goddess Aphrodite:]
Some say that the most beautiful thing
upon the black earth is an army of horsemen;
others, of infantry, still others, of ships;
but I say it is what one loves.
It is completely easy to make this
intelligible to everyone; for the woman
who far surpassed all mortals in beauty,
Helen, left her most brave husband
And sailed off to Troy, nor did she
remember at all her child
or her dear parents; but (the Cyprian)
led her away....
(All of which) has now reminded me
of Anaktoria, who is not here.
Her lovely walk and the bright sparkle of her face
I would rather look upon than
all the Lydian chariots
and full-armed infantry. [p.22]
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"...by far bigger than a big man."
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[Fragments from wedding songs. (The "hymeneal" is the wedding song; "Ares" is the god of war and the lover of Aphrodite):]
Raise high the roof-beams!
Sing the Hymeneal!
Raise it high, O carpenter men!
Sing the Hymeneal!
The bridegroom enters, like to Ares,
by far bigger than a big man. [p.
31]
[Another speaks again of gigantic size, but less heroically:]
The door-keeper's feet are seven fathoms long,
and his sandals are made of five ox-hides,
and ten shoemakers worked away to make them. [p.32]
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(Diane J. Rayor has translated all of the Greek women poets, including 68 fragments of Sappho. The notes are a bit sketchy, but Rayor's introduction places the women poets in the larger setting of the Greek lyric. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Sappho's lyre: archaic lyric and women poets of ancient Greece
/ translations, with introduction and notes by Diane J. Rayor;
foreword by W.R. Johnson. Berkeley: University of California
Press, c1991. (xxi, 207 p.: map)
LC#: PA3622 .R39 1991; ISBN: 0520073355, 0520073363
Includes bibliographical references (p. 197-201).
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"...the lovely times we.shared."
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[From a parchment; ellipses indicate missing material:]
"I simply wish to die."
Weeping she left me
and said this too:
"We've suffered terribly
Sappho I leave you against my will."
I answered, go happily
and remember me,
you know how we cared for you,
if not, let me remind you
...the lovely times we.shared.
Many crowns of violets.
roses and crocuses
...together you set before me
and many scented wreaths
made from blossoms
around your soft throat...
...with pure, sweet oil
...you anointed me,
and on a soft, gentle bed...
you quenched your desire...
...no holy site...
we left uncovered,
no grove... dance
...sound [p.60]
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"...longing for a boy."
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[Rayor's note points out that in the original the last word is "child," either male or female:]
Sweet mother, I cannot weave---
slender Aphrodite has overwhelmed me
with longing for a boy. [p.63]
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[Marguerite Johnson's brief study is a useful introduction to Sappho, discussing each of the poems (in Johnson's own translation) as well as how the poet has been seen and used by others. The text and the notes constitute a thorough review of recent criticism. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Johnson, Marguerite. Sappho (Ancients in action). London:
Bristol Classical Press/Gerald Duckworth & Co., 2007. (176
p.)
LC#: PA4409 .J54 2007; ISBN: 9781853996900
Includes bibliographical references (p. 150-171) and index
----------------------
[Margaret Reynolds' study /anthology shows how Sappho has been
used by writers from the time of ancient Greece through the 1990s.
The first chapter describes the finding and transmission of the
fragments of her poems; it then gives the original Greek and
literary translations of 30 fragments (for the "Hymn to
Aphrodite," for example, six English versions, written from
1711 to 1964, are given). The later chapters give passages of
works on Sappho themes or on the Sappho legend. (See
the book's table of contents online.):]
The Sappho companion / edited and introduced by Margaret Reynolds.
London: Chatto & Windus, 2000. (422 p.: ill.)
LC#: PA4409 .S36 2000x; ISBN: 0701165863
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[Reynolds' later book deals with how the legend of Sappho has been used by specific writers (and artists) from the mid-1700s to the early 1900s. However, throughout the book Reynolds gives her own readings of the poems (in Josephine Balmer's translation). (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Reynolds, Margaret. The Sappho history. New York, N.Y.: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2003. (xi, 311 p.)
LC#: PN57.S335 R49 2003; ISBN: 0333971701
Includes bibliographical references and index
-----------------------
[Margaret Williamson's study focuses on how Sappho was seen in antiquity: first describing the legends that developed about her, and the social and political background and attitudes toward sexuality of her period and later; and then using this information to analyze ten of the poems---"Sappho's daughters." (Chapters 3 and 4 can be seen at a link above, under "Online.) Until the last chapter, the quotations from Sappho are in Williamson's own translation. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Williamson, Margaret. Sappho's immortal daughters. Cambridge,
Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1995. (xi, 196 p., [12] p. of
plates: ill.)
LC#: PA409 .W55 1995; ISBN: 0674789121
Includes bibliographical references and index
----------------------
[Among the essays in this collection is Holt Parker's "Sappho's Public World," which presents Sappho not merely as a love poet but also as a political one, who like her fellow aristocrat and exile, Alcaeus, attacked the supporters of the tyrants ruling Mytilene. The bibliographical notes provide a summary of earlier critical studies. Quoted passages are in Parker's translation. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Women poets in ancient Greece and Rome / edited by Ellen Greene.
Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, c2005. (xxi, 234 p)
LC#: PA3067 .W66 2005; ISBN: 0806136634, 0806136642
Includes bibliographical references (p.[199]-217) and index
----------------------
[This collection includes Ellen Greene's essay "Subjects,
Objects, and Erotic Symmetry in Sappho's Fragments," which
analyzes the shifting and merging of the speaking voices in three
fragments ("Hymn to Aphrodite," "Honestly, I wish
I were dead," and "Some say that a troop of horsemen").
Greene sees in Sappho's method a rejection of the conventional
view of lovers as either active or passive. The transliterated
Greek and Greene's translation of each poem is given. (See
the book's table of contents online.):]
Among women: from the homosocial to the homoerotic in the
ancient world / edited by Nancy Sorkin Rabinowitz and Lisa Auanger.
Austin: University of Texas Press, 2002. (xv, 389 p.: ill.)
LC#: HQ75.5 .A485 2002; ISBN: 0292771134
Includes bibliographical references (p. 331-371) and index
----------------------
[One article in this collection, "Keening Sappho: Female
Speech in Sappho's Poetry," by Andre Lardinois, discusses
Sappho's prayers to goddesses and the combination of lament and
praise in her bridal songs; Lardinois also looks at what such
poetry reveals of women's roles in Greek society. (See
the book's table of contents online.):]
Making silence speak: women's voices in Greek literature and
society / edited by Andre Lardinois and Laura McClure. Princeton,
N.J.: Princeton University Press, c2001. ( x, 302 p.: ill.)
LC#: PA3067 .M35 2001; ISBN: 069100465X, 0691004668
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Updated 10-03-08