Songs
Victim of Venus, based on an ode by the Roman poet Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus 65 – 8 BC) isn’t a translation but a contemporary take on the poem. One of the characters in the novel An Ass’s Tale sings this song (p.222) in the course of a symposium-like party at which the topic of discussion is love, shortly after Billie Holiday’s What is this Thing Called Love plays on the stereo. My graduate work was in Classics and although Horace wasn’t one of my favorite authors (Catullus and Apuleius being more to my liking), this particular little poem has remained stuck in my mind. Here you can listen to the song, view the lyrics and read the original Latin along with a prose translation.
Lyrics
Put an end to your lamenting
Complaining your sweet’s gone sour
And found a younger rival
To share the pleasures of love’s hour.
Pretty Pat will cry her eyes out
Over Paul who’s fallen hard
For Helen who would sooner couple
With a stray dog in her yard.
That’s just the way of Venus ever
Joining in a gilded yoke
Disparate forms, unequal spirits
Delighting in her savage joke.
I, too, by chains of love so binding
Have recently become a thrall
To a lady whose raging fury
Is like a sudden summer squall.
Horace Odes I xxxiii
Albi, ne doleas plus nimio memor
inmitis Glycerae neu miserabilis
descantes elegos, cur tibi iunior
laesa praeniteat fide.
Insignem tenui fronte Lycorida 5
Cyri torret amor, Cyrus in asperam
declinat Pholoen: sed prius Apulis
iungentur capreae lupis
quam turpi Pholoe peccet adultero.
Sic visum Veneri, cui placet imparis 10
formas atque animos sub iuga aenea
saevo mittere cum ioco.
Ipsum me melior cum peteret Venus,
grata detinuit compede Myrtale
libertina, fretis acrior Hadriae 15
curuantis Calabros sinus.
Translation
TO ALBIUS TIBULLUS.
Grieve not too much, my Albius, thoughtful of cruel Glycera; nor chant your mournful elegies, because, as her faith being broken, a younger man is more agreeable, than you in her eyes. A love for Cyrus inflames Lycoris, distinguished for her little forehead: Cyrus follows the rough Pholoe; but she-goats shall sooner be united to the Apulian wolves, than Pholoe shall commit a crime with a base adulterer. Such is the will of Venus, who delights in cruel sport, to subject to her brazen yokes persons and tempers ill suited to each other. As for myself, the slave-born Myrtale, more untractable than the Adriatic Sea that forms the Calabrian gulfs, entangled me in a pleasing chain, at the very time that a more eligible love courted my embraces.
(from the public domain eBook “The Works of Horace” http://www.authorama.com/works-of-horace-1.html)
Maggie is whimsical ballad that appears early in the novel An Ass’s Tale (pp 24-5). John, the hero of the story narrates: “I sat there eating my sandwich and trying to catch the words of the songs coming through the speakers. One was about a fellow who, like me, wandered into a small cafe. How’s that for coincidence?” After providing the lyrics, he continues, “As if on cue, when the song ended, a young woman appeared in front of my table. ‘Well, look who’s here,’ she said, pulling out a chair. ‘Mind if I join you or are you saving the seat?'” You are now cordially invited to pull up a chair, pour yourself a cup of coffee and listen to the song John heard.
Lyrics
Strolling down a quiet street one cold November day
The scent of fresh brewed coffee led me to a small café
I found an empty table, settled down into a chair
And kicking off my overshoes, picked up a bill of fare
As I reclined contentedly and closed my weary eyes
A warm and friendly voice beside me took me by surprise
Looking up, I rubbed my eyes, my heart began to stir
A beautiful young waitress asked, “What can I get you sir?”
In just a wink she brought me a coffee and a roll
She smiled at me mysteriously with eyes as black as coal
Then much to my amazement and also my delight
She took a seat beside me in a manner so polite
At once we started chatting in such a natural way
That sharing all our secret dreams somehow seemed OK
We talked as if we’d known each other since our early youth
When someone called out for his bill from a nearby booth
When Maggie heard the summons (for Maggie was her name)
She rushed off to her customer, which was an awful shame
But as she fluttered past me, she whispered to me, “Jack,
I’ll just be gone a minute, you know I’ll be right back.”
Thinking of my Maggie, for I meant to make her mine
The life we’d have together would be altogether fine
A voice as shrill as nails on glass cut into my dream
I looked up at a countenance miserable and mean
“Let me take your order; I haven’t got all day”
Was all the shriveled waitress standing by me had to say.
I said, “Maggie is my waitress,” she just looked at me queer
And declared, “My name is Mildred, I’m the only waitress here.”
Suddenly I knew the truth, and sad as it may seem
My beloved Maggie was nothing but a dream
I slipped my overshoes back on, and feeling lost and old
I walked out of that quaint café back into the cold.
Another Chance started out not as a full song but a single verse to close the novel Chance. Jeremy Chance, the main character “had forgotten to turn off the radio before going to sleep. A song welcomed him to the new day. The melody wasn’t familiar but the rhythm drew him in, and then he heard his name — no not his name, just some words in a song: If I had another chance to choose who I could be,/I’d pass it up ’cause I prefer to keep on being me. Although I’ve had my ups and downs, there’s nothing I regret, And every day I’ve lived I’ve learned from everyone I’ve met.” Some time after the book was published I decided to actually write the song which goes like this.
Lyrics
Something that I think about
Every now and then
Is what I’d do if I had the chance
To live my life again
If I had another chance
I wonder who I’d be
If I could change the way I look
The way I think and see
But even if I had the chance to choose who I could be
Chances are I’d make the choice to keep on being me
Though I’ve had my ups and downs
There’s nothing I regret
‘Cause every day I lived I learned
From everyone I met
When I think of the days gone by
The good times and the bad
I wouldn’t trade a minute
Of the life I’ve had
But even if I had the chance to choose who I could be
Chances are I’d make the choice to keep on being me
If my life were rearranged
I wonder what I’d do
If I had wealth and fortune
Without ever meeting you
What’s the use of having
All the blessings from above
If you were missing from my life
You and your sweet love
I don’t need another chance to choose who I should be
Why should I be somebody else, I’m used to being me