Reconsiderations December 2020
More lasting than bronze
On the many translations of a famous ode by Horace.
What is the most translated poem in history? Or, rather, which poem can boast the most distinguished roll of translators? One answer to these questions is the fifth poem in Book One of Horace’s Odes, published in 23 B.C., in the early years of the Augustan era. The Odes are the best productions of ancient Rome’s most endearing and most balanced poet, who built—as he himself forecast—“a monument more lasting than bronze.”
Quis multa gracilis te puer in rosa
perfusus liquidis urget odoribus
grato, Pyrrha, sub antro?
cui flavam religas comam,
simplex munditiis? heu...
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