Poets Translate Poets: A Hudson Review Anthology (24 page)

ed drum in gaps between the phrases
)

and get it in here

under my collar bone.

Your mother’s to blame for this.

Damn’d atheist, that’s what she is.

And I wish her the same.

(
pause, then sotto voce
)

Brother of God, Sweet Hell, be decent.

Let me lie down and rest.

Swift -feathered Death, that are the end of shame.

k ho: Scares me to hear him.

And when you think what he was.

h e r : Many and hot, and that’s not just talking,

my own hands, and my own back doing the dirty work.

But God’s bitch never put one like this over on me,

nor that grump Rustheus either.

S opho c l e s
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And now Miss Oineus

with her pretty little shift y eyes

m’la calata
,

has done me to beat all the furies,

got me into a snarl, clamped this net onto me

and she wove it.

It sticks to my sides and

has gnawed through to my furtherest in’nards.

And now it’s stopped the green blood,

got into the lungs and dries up the tubes along with them,

tears up all the rest of me.

Holds me down, like in fetters. I can’t explain it.

No gang of plainsmen with spears,

no army of giants come up out of the earth,

no wild beast was strong enough. Nor Greeks,

nor foreigners whose countries I had cleaned up,

but a pindling female did it,

not even a man with balls.

Alone and without a sword.

Boy, you start showing whose son you are. I.e. mine,

and as for the highly revered title to motherhood,

you get that producer out of her house

and hand her over to me. We’ll see whether

you feel worse watching me rot or

seeing her cut up and brought to justice.

Go, pick up your courage. Get going and

have mercy on me

or pity, that’s it: pity. Me blubbering like a fl apper,

no man ever saw me taken like this before

or said I groaned over my troubles,

now I fi nd out I’m a sissy. Come here. Nearer,

see what your father is brought to.

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(
he throws off the sheet covering him
)

Without the wrappings,

look at it, all of you,

ever see a body in this condition?

Gosh!

Th

at’s a death-rattle again. Disgraceful.

Got me here on the side again, eating through me.

Can’t seem to get rid of it.

Lord of Hell, take me.

Th

undering Lord God, if you’ve got a crash-rattle,

throw

it.

God our father of Th

under.

Th

ere it is gnawing again,

budding,

blossoming.

OH my hand, my hands,

back, chest, my lovely arms,

what you used to be. Th

at lion that was killing off

the Newman cattle-men, the Hydra in Lerna

and those unsociable bardots, half man and half horse,

the whole gang of them all together

arrogant, lawless, surpassing strong,

and the Eurymanthian animal, and that three-headed pup

from Hell down under, the Echidna’s nursling

brought up by an out-size viper,

and the dragon-guard of the golden apples

at the end of the world.

And a great lot of other work,

and nobody took any prizes away from me.

No joints, no strength in ’em,

all torn to pieces.

Th

is blind calamity,

and my mother was a notable woman

and my father in heaven, Zeus, mid the stars.

S opho c l e s
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Th

at’s what they say.

But I tell you this much. I can’t even crawl,

but bring her here and I’ll learn her,

I’ll make her a lesson: Alive or dead how I

pay people for dirty work.

k ho: Poor Greece, you can see troubles coming

if you let such a man down.

h y l : You seem to expect me to answer.

You’re quiet, as if expecting an answer.

Now if I may ask you for justice,

and tell you how useless it is to want to break her.

h e r : Say what you’ve got to say, and get it over with.

I’m too sick to be pestered with double-talk and nuances.

h y l : It’s about mother’s mistake.

What’s happened. She didn’t mean it.

h e r : Well of all the dirtiest . . .

Your bloody murdering mother

and you dare to mention her

in my earshot!

h y l : It’s about mother’s mistake.

h e r : No, I dare say past crimes ought to be—

h y l : And you’ll mention what’s happened today.

h e r : Speak up. But be careful,

it won’t show your breeding.

h y l : Well, she’s dead. Just been killed.

h e r : By whom?

Th

at’s a bad sign.

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h y l : She did it.

h e r : And cheated me out of the chance.

h y l : If you knew all the facts, you’d quit being angry.

h e r : Th

azza good tough start. Give.

h y l : She just didn’t mean any harm. She meant well.

h e r : You louse! Meant well by killing your father?

h y l : An aphrodisiac. Th

ought it would

get you back, and went wrong, when she

saw the new wife in the house.

h e r : Th

e Trachinians got witch-doctors that good?

h y l : Nessus told her a long time ago

that the philtre would start that sort of letch.

h e r : Misery. I’m going out

and my light’s gone.

Th

e black out!

I understand perfectly well

where things have got to . . . Go, son,

call all my seed and their kindred,

and Alkmene, ill-starred for the empty name

of the Godhead, my mother,

so they can get my last report

of the oracles, as I know them.

h y l : Your mother is at Tiryns out of reach

and took some of the children with her.

Others are in Th

ebes-burg, I’ll round up

the near ones, if that’s O.K.,

and they’ll do what you tell them.

h e r : Listen fi rst, and show what you’re made of,

S opho c l e s
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my stock. My father told me long ago

that no living man should kill me,

but that someone from hell would, and

that brute of a Centaur has done it.

Th

e dead beast kills the living me.

And that fi ts another odd forecast

breathed out at the Selloi’s oak—

Th

ose fellows rough it,

sleep on the ground, up in the hills there.

I heard it and wrote it down

under my Father’s tree.

Time lives, and it’s going on now.

I am released from trouble.

I thought it meant life in comfort.

It doesn’t. It means that I die.

For amid the dead there is no work in service.

Come at it that way, my boy, what

SPLENDOUR,

IT ALL COHERES.2

[
He turns his face from the audience, then sits erect, facing them without the
mask of agony; the revealed make-up is that of solar serenity. Th

e hair

golden and as electrifi ed as possible
.]

But you must help me

and don’t make me lose my temper,

don’t dither, and don’t ask me why.

Th

is is the great rule: Filial Obedience.

2. Th

is is the key phrase, for which the play exists, as in the
Elektra
: “Need we add cowardice to all the rest of these ills?” Or the: “T’as inventé la justice” in Cocteau’s
Antigone
. And, later: “Tutto quello che è accaduto, doveva accadere.” At least one sensitive hellenist who has shown great care for Sophokles’ words has failed to grasp the main form of the play, either here or in the fi rst chorus, and how snugly each segment of the work fi ts into its box.

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h y l : I will obey.

h e r (
extending his hand
): Put her there.

h y l : I’ll do it. I don’t need to swear.

h e r : Put it there.

h y l (
complying
): What am I swearing to?

h e r : Repeat: “By the head of Zeus,”

you will do what I tell you to.

h y l : I swear, so help me God.

h e r : “And God damn all perjurers.”

h y l : I’ll keep it anyhow.

(
adds aft er almost imperceptible pause
)

And God DAMN all perjurers.

h e r : You know the highest peak of Zeus’ hill in Oeta?

h y l : Sacrifi ced there quite oft en.

h e r : You must get this carcass up there,

by hand, with as many friends as you like.

And cut a lot of wood from deep-rooted oaks

and from wild olive (male trees)

lopped

off the same way.

Get it going with the bright fl ame of a pine torch.

And put me onto the pyre.

Don’t blubber. Show that you are my son

or you’ll have my ghost heavy on you

from below there,

forever.

h y l : But father . . .

have I got all this straight?

S opho c l e s
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h e r : Got your orders. Do ’em,

or change your name.

h y l : Good lord, you want me to be a murderer

and a parricide?

h e r : No, a physician,

the only one who can heal.

h y l : But how come, if I burn it?

h e r : If you are afraid of that,

do the rest.

h y l : I don’t mind carrying you up there.

h e r : And build the pyre? As I tell you to do?

h y l : So long as I don’t have to light it

with my own hands,

I’ll do my bit.

h e r : And another little job

that won’t take long

aft er the big one.

h y l : I don’t care what size it is. It’ll get done.

h e r : You know that kid of Eurytus’s?

h y l : Iole? I guess you mean Iole.

h e r : Ezakly.

When I am dead, if you revere your agreement,

remember it and marry the girl.

Don’t disobey me.

She has lain beside me. No other man

but you is to have her.

You agree to the greater, don’t jib at the less.

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h y l : But I’d have to be possessed of a devil to do it.

Better die with you. She caused mother’s death

and your torture. She’s our worst enemy.

h e r : Th

e fellow doesn’t seem to want to carry out

his dad’s last request.

God’s worst curse falls on a disobedient son.

h y l : Th

e delirium’s coming back.

h e r : Yes, because you’re stirring it up.

h y l : What
am
I to do, in this mess?

h e r : Start by hearing straight.

What I’m telling you,

the dad that made you.

h y l : Have you got to teach me crime?

h e r : It is no crime to gladden a father’s heart.

h y l : If you order me to, is that legal?

Perfectly all right?

h e r : I call the gods to witness.

h y l : Th

en I’ll go ahead. If it’s set before the gods

that way, I can’t be blamed for obeying you.

h e r : Fine. At last, and get going.

Get me onto that fi re, before this pain

starts again. Hey, you there, hoist me up

for the last trouble.

Th

e last rest.

h y l : Nothing to stop us now. You’re the driver.

h e r : Come ere the pain awake,

O stubborn mind.

S opho c l e s
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(
catches sight of
h y l l o s’
face and breaks off with
)

And put some cement in your face,

reinforced concrete, make a cheerful fi nish

even if you don’t want to.

h y l : Hoist him up, fellows.

And for me a great tolerance,

matching the gods’ great unreason.

Th

ey see the things being done,

calamities looked at,

sons to honour their fathers,

and of what is to come, nothing is seen. Gods!

Our present miseries, their shame. And of all men

none has so borne, nor ever shall again.

And now ladies, let you go home.

Today we have seen strange deaths,

wrecks many, such as have not been suff ered before.

And all of this is from Zeus.

[
Exeunt: Th

e girls left
, h y l l o s
and bearers right
.]