Sappho: Memoir, Text, Selected Renderings and a Literal Translation

Merino, a third edition of which was published at Madrid early last year. Written in Spanish, it discusses in an impartial spirit every question concerning Sappho, and is especially valuable for its copious references.

Professor Domenico Comparetti, the celebrated Florentine scholar, to whom I shall have occasion to refer hereafter, has recently done much to familiarize Italian readers with the chief points of Sapphic criticism. His enthusiasm for her character and genius is all that can be desired, but his acceptance of Welcker’s arguments is not so complete as mine. Where truth must lie between two extremes, and evidence on either side is so hard to collect and estimate, it is possible for differently constituted minds to reach very different conclusions. The motto at the back of my title page is the guide I am most willing to follow. But after all, to use the words of a friend whom I consulted on the subject, “whether the pure think her emotion pure or impure; whether the impure appreciate it rightly, or misinterpret it; whether, finally, it was platonic or not; seems to me to matter nothing.” Sappho’s poetic eminence is independent of such considerations. To her,

All thoughts, all passions, all delights,

Whatever stirs this mortal frame,

All are but ministers of Love,

And feed his sacred flame.