poetree | Belated Picnic

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sunday picnic

Belated Picnic

Sunday, every Sunday, let's have a community picnic. It's probably been a long week, and it's lovely to have a few minutes to sit back and relax and enjoy some good conversation in a less formal space. Feel free to bring something for the Picnic Basket - a poem you liked this week, a thought you had or something you experienced, or even something completely unrelated to poetry whatsoever that you just feel like sharing. Just take a moment to say hello, and maybe have a bite to eat; no one is going anywhere fast, and the shade promises some relief from the everyday heat. Let’s get to know each other a bit better, here under the branches of the poet’s tree.

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I needed something completely and entirely fluffy this week, so I'm now ten cantos into a reread of Orlando Furioso.

Of loves and ladies, knights and arms, I sing,
Of courtesies, and many a daring feat;
And from those ancient days my story bring,
When Moors from Afric passed in hostile fleet,
And ravaged France, with Agramant their king,
Flushed with his youthful rage and furious heat,
Who on king Charles', the Roman emperor's head
Had vowed due vengeance for Troyano dead.

In the same strain of Roland will I tell
Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme,
On whom strange madness and rank fury fell,
A man esteemed so wise in former time;
If she, who to like cruel pass has well
Nigh brought my feeble wit which fain would climb
And hourly wastes my sense, concede me skill
And strength my daring promise to fulfil.

Not the best translation ever, but it gets the job done.

(Why yes, you do see a line riffed on by Milton. Spenser stole half his plots from this thing as well.)

---L.

Bradamante is one of my all-time favourite heroines (although not necessarily at her best in Furioso). :-)

She does get handed the Idiot Ball a few times over the story, yeah. About the same number of times as Ruggiero, if it comes to that -- thus showing they deserve each other.

---L.

If nothing else, they inspired Handel to write two decent roles for mezzo sopranos. (Although my favorite aria in Alcina was definitely written for a coloratura: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnb3m90nl-E) :-)