Monday, May 06, 2013

 

An Ode by Olivier de Magny

I was recently reading about Olivier de Magny (1529-1561) in Arthur Tilley, The Literature of the French Renaissance, Vol. II (Cambridge: At the University Press, 1904), pp. 10-15. Tilley quotes one of Magny's odes, addressed to Guillaume du Buys, and calls it (p. 14) "a concise and beautiful expression of that Renaissance spirit of which Magny was so representative a type." I understood some of the ode, but a few words and phrases escaped my comprehension. I asked about them in an email to Pierre Wechter, who not only patiently answered my questions, but kindly provided his own elegant English translation, with very helpful notes.



A GVILLAVME DV BVYS.
                 ODE.


Pour garder que le plaiſir
Qui nous vient ore ſayſir,
De long temps ne nous eſchappe,       
Du Buys, fais porter la nappe,
Et dreſſer viſte à manger,             5
Tandis ie vaiz arranger
Deça & de la Catulle,
Properce, Ouide, & Tibulle,
Deſſus la table eſpendus,
Entre les lucz bien tendus,           10
Et les lucz entre les rozes,
Et les rozes my decloses
Entre les oeilletz fleuriz,
Les oeilletz entre les liz,
Et les liz entre les taſſes,             15
Parmy les vaiſſelles graſſes.
La mort, peult eſtre, demain
Viendra prendre par la main
Le plus gay de ceſte trouppe,
Pour l’enleuer ſur ſa croupe         20
Luy diſant à l’impourueu
Sus, gallant, ceſt, aſſez beu,
Il eſt temps de venir boire
Aux enfers de l’onde noire. [1559]
         Lest pleasure now gripping us should before long escape, mind, Du Buis, thou have the tablecloth brought and the table quickly set up for dinner, while I busy myself disposing here and there books by Catullus, Propertius, Ovid and Tibullus sprawling on the table, among the well-strung lutes, and the lutes among the roses, and the half-abloom roses among the full-blown carnations, the carnations among the lilies, and the lilies among the cups, amid the greasy plates.
         Death, perhaps, will tomorrow come and take hold by his hand of the merriest of us all, snatching him away riding pillion, when least expected, with these words: “On thy way, fun-lover, desist [thou], enough quaffing; time for thee to come and drink from the dark streams of Hell.”

Guillaume Du Buis [1520?-1594] was a minor poet.

ℓ. 2 « ore » ‘now’
ℓ. 5 « dreſſer » [la table]
ℓ. 6 « Tandis ie vaiz » would be nowadays « Tandis que je vais »
ℓ. 7 « Deça & de la » would nowadays be « Deçà et delà » ‘here and there’
ℓ. 10 « les lucz » = les luths ; cf. Olivier de Magny, about the famous poetess Louise Labé, nicknamed la belle cordière (her husband was a cord-merchant ; with a pun on cord/chord) :
Ores donq’ il fault que ſon heur,
Et ſa conſtance & ſon honneur
Sur mon
luth vivement i’accorde,
Pinſetant l’argentine corde
Du
luc de madame parfaict.
ℓ. 16 « Parmy les vaiſſelles graſſes » ‘in the middle of greasy crockery/plate’
ℓ. 19 (obviously, it seems to me, the poet is referring to himself)
ℓ. 20 « Pour l’enleuer ſur ſa croupe » ‘to kidnap/abduct him on Death’s horse’
ℓ. 22 « ceſt, aſſez beu » the question is, was the comma intended by the poet, or not ? If it’s intentional (the spelling is not c’eſt, with an apostrophe), the only solution is to consider it’s the imperative of cesser ‘cease, stop, desist, leave off’ [though, of course, it should be ceſſe]; if it’s not, then the apostrophe in c’eſt must have been dropped and one should read c’eſt aſſez beu ‘there has been enough drinking’. If only for the sake of rhythm (1-2-1-3), I’d choose to leave the text standing. (Such is not Rouget’s opinion, see below.)

Footnotes by François Rouget, 1995 edition, p. 327-328 :

Cette pièce est une contamination de plusieurs passages d’Horace (Carm., I.36, II.7 et 11, III.14), d’Anacréon (« Ou moi melei Gugao » [sic ; Oὔ μοι μέλει τὰ Γύγεω], rec. d’Henri Estienne, Paris, 1554, n°15) et de Ronsard, « Odelette », « J’ay l’esprit tout ennuié » (Bocage, 1554, Lm*., t. VI, pp. 105-107). […] *(Paul Laumonier) — (H. Estienne’s reading is Γύγαο.)
ℓℓ. 7-10 Souvenir de Ronsard, ode « A Jan de La Hurteloire » (Odes, II, 14, vv. 21-22, dans la variante de 1555 : « Pelle melle dessus la table / Tibulle, Ovide soient ouvers »).
ℓℓ. 11-15 Réminiscence d’Horace, Carm., I.36 ; II.3, vv. 13-14.
ℓℓ. 17-24 Traduction des derniers vers de l’ode d’Anacréon citée, cela par l’intermédiaire de Ronsard, « Odelette » (Bocage, 1554), Lm., t. VI, p. 107, vv. 45-50. Le vers 22 de Magny reprend presque mot à mot la fin de la pièce de Ronsard : « Me hapant à l’impourveu, / Meurs, gallant, c’est assés beu ».



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