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Unread 08-28-2021, 06:50 PM
Allen Tice's Avatar
Allen Tice Allen Tice is offline
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"May I write words more naked than flesh, stronger than bone..."

I have zero quarrel with the directness of the imagery, but I have not yet found, Internet-wise, a locus in Greek for this text. At the moment I am away from my hard copy Greek sources (that include Willis Barnstone, Lobel-Page, and others). Sappho (Ψαπφω) has long been a magnet for attribution and secondary comparison. The best works on her (including Voigt) invariably give a source text number, whether from a papyrus, an ostracon, or Hephaestion. In a few days if I find such a locus, I will return to this thread with that source. In the mean time, I encourage others, like Poochigian, to step in with a Greek data locus, if there is one actually.

Last edited by Allen Tice; 08-28-2021 at 10:13 PM.
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Unread 08-29-2021, 01:09 PM
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Sarah-Jane Crowson Sarah-Jane Crowson is offline
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Thanks Allen, you're a superstar.

You've also solved a puzzle for me as when I initially moved beyond the paperback & looked briefly on the internet I noticed little markers/tags (fr.1 etc - as in this page) which I thought would be some kind of citation, but wasn't sure quite what. These must be the source text number.

Either way, I think my particular issue is resolved. I don't think it's Sappho. I've got my hands on a full copy of 'Dictee' now (it's a fascinating piece of work) & the epigraph reads:

May I write words more naked than flesh, stronger than bone, more resilient than sinew, sensitive than nerve.

Sappho


So, no tag/marker. And the book itself plays with language, with stories, with punctuation and structure. It's part of the form of the book. My guess it will be Theresa Hak Kyung Cha's uses of Sappho (and the idea of an epigraph) as part of the overall book's structure and sense-making.

Pragmatically, I've moved on. I have to - no time to pause. There are some wonderful lines in 'Dictee' about Mother Tongue which are perfect for my purposes, and there are plenty of other lines from Sappho I can use, too.

The world of quotations is crazy and beautiful and weird. Yesterday was Anais Nin, who is meant to have said:

We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are


Which she did, in Seduction of the Minotaur, whilst attributing it to the Talmud, which it probably doesn't come from although the internet thinks it does, although it's also attributed (on the internet) to Kant.

Right, enough idle flim-flam. Back to work for me.

Thanks again,

Sarah-Jane
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