20 June 2022 – Women Poets #3 Sappho

Sappho: A Brief History of Womankind’s Poetic Evolution

Dear Readers of All Genders,

Two posts past, I shared the startling, and somewhat embarrassing, fact that since the beginning of the Wannaska Almanac’s publication, of roughly 208 Mondays, only ten female poets have been featured. A real travesty especially because I am a woman. The only tiny saving grace is that my work has been featured many times; still, I only count as one woman. Sum total: eleven.

I have begun and will continue to make amends for ignoring my own gender.

For 10-12 weeks, we will continue to explore women who write poetry across great stretches of time, and who shine a light on these unusual artists and their contributions to poetry throughout history. Each of these poets was/is a groundbreaker in some way: form, style, subject matter, internal exploration, and more. This is not to say that we leave behind men who are poets. It’s like someone we know said last week, “I demand equal time!” Just sayin’. 

Today’s post continues the presentation of many more profiles and poetry by remarkable women who have left their mark on the evolution of the Muses’ most delicate and most bombastic of the arts. We will take our inspiration from this site: https://www.readpoetry.com/female-poets-poetry/. That’s where we start. Further research on the times, temperament, and tempestuous adventures of these women continues where the brief presentations on the aforementioned site leave off.

So, today, we meet Sappho, C. 630-C.570 BC, a controversial figure in her own time and even to this day. Modern women-in-the-arts movements could be said to be extensions of what Sappho and a few others started. Sappho’s surroundings were in Ancient Greece. She lived on the island of Lesbos, where she was known for her lyric poetry. Most of her written work has been lost due to its antiquity. Sappho was praised during her life; however in the fourth century A.D., the church first criticized and then demolished what they could. The criticism centered on Sappho’s erotic and lesbian images. By the medieval period, Sappho's works had been lost, though she was still quoted in later authors. During the Renaissance, great efforts were made to recover her poetry. These endeavors continue to this day.

by John William Godward

Preliminary note: You may want to read the “Background” in this post before you read Sappho’s poems. As is true of the best writers, her unusual life informed her work. 

“Ode to Aphrodite” is the only Sappho poem that has come down to us complete. It is presented in two forms here: the modern poetic form with line breaks and stanzas, and following that, the poem appears in story form using paragraph/block style. 

Ode to Aphrodite

Shimmering-throned immortal Aphrodite,

Daughter of Zeus, Enchantress, I implore thee,

Spare me, O queen, this agony and anguish,

     Crush not my spirit

II

Whenever before thou has hearkened to me--

To my voice calling to thee in the distance,

And heeding, thou hast come, leaving thy father's

     Golden dominions,

III

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,

IV

Then, soon they arrived and thou, blessed goddess,

With divine countenance smiling, didst ask me

What new woe had befallen me now and why,

     Thus I had called the.

V

What in my mad heart was my greatest desire,

Who was it now that must feel my allurements,

Who was the fair one that must be persuaded,

     Who wronged thee Sappho?

VI

For if now she flees, quickly she shall follow

And if she spurns gifts, soon shall she offer them

Yea, if she knows not love, soon shall she feel it

     Even reluctant.

VII

Come then, I pray, grant me surcease from sorrow,

Drive away care, I beseech thee, O goddess

Fulfil for me what I yearn to accomplish,

     Be thou my ally.

Deathless Aphrodite, throned in flowers,

Daughter of Zeus, O terrible enchantress,

With this sorrow, with this anguish, break my spirit

Lady, not longer!

Hear anew the voice! O hear and listen!

Come, as in that island dawn thou camest,

Billowing in thy yoked car to Sappho

Forth from thy father's

Golden house in pity! ... I remember:

Fleet and fair thy sparrows drew thee, beating

Fast their wings above the dusky harvests,

Down the pale heavens,

Lightning anon! And thou, O blest and brightest,

Smiling with immortal eyelids, asked me:

'Maiden, what betideth thee? Or wherefore

Callest upon me?

'What is here the longing more than other,

Here in this mad heart? And who the lovely

One beloved that wouldst lure to loving?

Sappho, who wrongs thee?

'See, if now she flies, she soon must follow;

Yes, if spurning gifts, she soon must offer;

Yes, if loving not, she soon must love thee,

Howso unwilling...'

Come again to me! O now! Release me!

End the great pang! And all my heart desireth

Now of fulfillment, fulfill! O Aphrodite,

Fight by my shoulder!

 

Ornate-throned immortal Aphrodite, wile-weaving daughter of Zeus, I entreat you: do not overpower my heart, mistress, with ache and anguish, but come here, if ever in the past you heard my voice from afar and acquiesced and came, leaving your father’s golden house, with chariot yoked: beautiful swift sparrows whirring fast-beating wings brought you above the dark earth down from heaven through the mid-air, and soon they arrived; and you, blessed one, with a smile on your immortal face asked what was the matter with me this time and why I was calling this time and what in my maddened heart I most wished to happen for myself: “Whom am I to persuade this time to lead you back to her love? Who wrongs you, Sappho? If she runs away, soon she shall pursue; if she does not accept gifts, why, she shall give them instead; and if she does not love, soon she shall love even against her will.” Come to me now again and deliver me from oppressive anxieties; fulfil all that my heart longs to fulfil, and you yourself be my fellow-fighter.

Background

It may be argued that Sappho is the most renowned lyric poet of the Western tradition. Her work has remained current for over 2,000 years; yet she is ironically, famously obscure.

Sappho's poems usually focus on the relationships among women. This focus has given rise to speculation that Sappho's interest in women was what today would be called homosexual or lesbian; the word "lesbian" comes from the island of Lesbos and the communities of women there.

While Sappho's poetry was admired in the ancient world, her character was not always so well considered. In the Roman period, critics found her lustful and perhaps even homosexual. Horace called her "mascula Sappho" in his Epistles, which the later Porphyrio commented was "either because she is famous for her poetry, in which men more often excel, or because she is maligned for having been a tribad". By the third century CE, the difference between Sappho's literary reputation as a poet and her moral reputation as a woman had become so significant that the suggestion that there were in fact two Sapphos began to develop.

A tradition going back at least to Menander suggested that Sappho killed herself by jumping off the Leucadian cliffs for love of Phaon, a ferryman. This is regarded as ahistorical by modern scholars, perhaps invented by the comic poets or originating from a misreading of a first-person reference in a non-biographical poem. The legend may have resulted in part from a desire to assert Sappho as heterosexual.

Exploration 1: How does Sappho’s life and predilections compare/contrast with women in this century? In other words, does the profile of Sappho’s life resemble (or not) the concerns, desires, and lives of women in 2022?

Exploration 2: “Ode to Aphrodite”: Do you think Sappho is actually in love with Aphrodite?