Authors: C. P. Cavafy, Aliki Barnstone
ISBN-13: 9780393328998, ISBN-10: 0393328996
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Date Published: March 2007
Edition: (Non-applicable)
Aliki Barnstone’s translations have appeared in American Poetry Review, TriQuarterly, Virginia Quarterly Review, and other journals. An editor and critic, she lives in Las Vegas and teaches at UNLV.
Book Synopsis
A new translation of a poet widely considered one of the most important of the twentieth century.
The Washington Post - Michael Dirda
At its best, his mature work hardly seems poetry at all. (Marguerite Yourcenar once likened his short pieces to reading notes or aides-memoires .) Cavafy prefers nouns and avoids epithets, uses rhyme sparingly if at all, offers lots of historical or physical detail, and typically casts a poem as a dramatic monologue. Even his titles are oddly prosaic, though touched with a kind of shabby grandeur: "A Byzantine nobleman in exile composing verses" or "The melancholy of Iason Kleandros, poet in Kommagini, 595 C.E." In fact, Cavafy gains most of his power, as the Greek poet George Seferis insists, when we view his work as "one and the same poem" and "read him with the feeling of the continuous presence of his work as a whole.
Table of Contents
Foreword Gerald Stern xvii
Acknowledgments xxv
Introduction: C. P. Cavafy: Eros and History as Prophesy xxix
1896
Julian at the Mysteries 3
1897
Walls 5
An Old Man 6
The Horses of Achilles 7
1898
Prayer 8
The Funeral of Sarpedon 9
1899
Candles 11
The First Step 12
1900
When the Watchman Saw the Light 13
The Enemies 14
1901
Che Fece...Il Gran Rifiuto 15
The Souls of Old Men 16
Interruption 17
1903
The Windows 18
Thermopylae 19
Growing Strong 20
1904
September, 1903 21
December, 1903 22
January, 1904 23
On the Stairs 24
At the Theater 25
Disloyalty 26
Waiting for the Barbarians 28
Voices 30
Desires 31
1905
Trojans 32
1906
King Dimitrios 33
1907
Antony's Ending 34
TheProcession of Dionysos 35
1908
Hidden Things 36
Monotony 37
1909
This Is the Man 38
The Footsteps 39
1910
The City 40
The Satrapy 41
1911
The Ides of March 42
Finished 43
A Sculptor from Tyana 44
The God Abandons Antony 45
Ionian 46
The Glory of the Ptolemies 47
Ithaka 48
On Hearing of Love 50
The Dangers 51
1912
Philhellene 52
Herodis Attikos 53
Alexandrian Kings 54
Come Back 56
In Church 57
1913
Very Rarely 58
As Much as You Can 59
For the Shop 60
I Went 61
"I Will Tell the Rest to Those Down in Hades" 62
Like This 63
1914
Exiles 64
The Tomb of Lysias the Grammarian 65
The Tomb of Evrion 66
Chandelier 67
Far Off 68
1915
The Wise Sense What Is to Come 69
Theodotos 70
At the Cafe Door 71
He Swears 72
As I Lounged and Lay on Their Beds 73
One Night 74
Morning Sea 75
Drawn 76
1916
Orofernis 77
The Battle of Magnesia 80
Manuel Komninos 82
The Displeasure of the Selefkid 83
When They Are Aroused 85
In the Street 86
Before the Statue of Endymion 87
1917
In a City of Osroini 88
Passing Through 89
For Ammonis, Who Died at Twenty-nine, in 610 90
One of Their Gods 91
Evening 92
Sensual Pleasure 93
Gray 94
The Tomb of Iasis 95
In the Month of Athyr 96
I Have Gazed So Long 97
The Tomb of Ignatios 98
House with Garden 99
Days of 1903 100
Half an Hour 101
The Tobacco Shop Window 102
1917 or 1918
Remember, Body... 103
The Tomb of Lanis 104
Meaning 105
1918
Kaisarion 106
Nero's Term 108
Envoys from Alexandria 109
Aristovoulos 110
In the Port 112
Aimilianos Monai, Alexandrian, 628-655 C.E. 113
Since Nine O'Clock 114
1919
Outside the House 115
The Next Table 116
The Bandaged Shoulder 117
The Afternoon Sun 118
Imenos 119
Of the Jews (50 C.E.) 120
To Stay 121
Of Dimitrios Sotir (162-150 B.C.E.) 122
On the Ship 124
1920
If Truly Dead 125
Young Men from Sidon (400 C.E.) 127
So They Will Come 129
Dareios 130
Anna Komnini 132
1921
A Byzantine Nobleman in Exile Composing Verses 133
Their Beginning 134
The Favor of Alexandros Valas 135
The Melancholy of Iason Kleandros, Poet in Kommagini, 595 C.E. 136
Dimaratos 137
I Brought to Art 139
From the School of the Celebrated Philosopher 140
A Craftsman of Wine Bowls 142
1922
Those Who Fought for the Achaian League 143
To Antiohos Epifanis 144
In an Old Book 145
1923
In Despair 146
From the Drawer 147
Julian Seeing Indifference 148
Epitaph of Antiohos, King of Kommagini 149
Theater of Sidon (400 C.E.) 150
1924
Julian in Nikomedia 151
Before Time Changed Them- 152
He Came to Read 153
In Alexandria, 31 B.C.E. 154
Ioannis Kantakouzinos Triumphs 155
1925
Temethos, Antiochian, 400 C.E. 156
Of Colored Glass 157
The Twenty-fifth Year of His Life 158
On an Italian Shore 159
In the Boring Village 160
Apollonios of Tyana in Rhodes 161
1926
The Illness of Kleitos 162
In a Township in Asia Minor 163
The Priest of Serapeion 164
In the Bars 165
A Grand Procession of Priests and Laymen 166
A Sophist Leaving Syria 167
Julian and the Antiochians 168
1927
Anna Dalassini 169
Days of 1896 170
Two Young Men, Twenty-three to Twenty-four Years Old 171
Greek since Ancient Times 173
Days of 1901 174
1928
You Did Not Know 175
A Young Man, an Artist of the Word, in His Twenty-fifth Year 176
In Sparta 177
Portrait of a Twenty-three-Year-Old Man, Painted by His Friend the Same Age, an Amateur 178
In a Large Greek Colony, 200 B.C.E. 179
A Prince from Western Libya 181
Kimon, Son of Learhos, Twenty-two, Student of Greek Letters (in Kyrini) 182
On the March to Sinopi 184
Days of 1909, '10, and '11 186
1929
Myris: Alexandria, 340 C.E. 187
Alexandros Iannaios and Alexandra 190
Beautiful White Flowers Became Him 191
Come, O King of the Lacedaimonians 193
In the Same Space 194
1930
The Mirror in the Front Hall 195
He Asked about the Quality 196
They Should Have Cared 198
1931
According to the Recipes of the Ancient Greco-Syrian Magicians 200
In 200 B.C.E 201
1932
Days of 1908 203
1935
In the Suburbs of Antioch 205
A Note on the Transliteration of Names 207
Notes 209
A Note on the Text, Selection, and Order of the Poems 255
A Biographical Note on Cavafy 257
Index of Titles and First Lines 260
Subjects