Catullus 5 is a passionate and perhaps the most famous poem by Catullus

Catullus

Gaius Valerius Catullus was a Latin poet of the Republican period. His surviving works are still read widely, and continue to influence poetry and other forms of art.-Biography:...

. The poem encourages lovers to scorn the snide comments of others, and to live only for each other, since life is too brief and death brings on a night of perpetual sleep. Over the centuries, this poem has been translated and imitated many times; its sentiments seem timeless.

The meter

Meter (poetry)

In poetry, metre is the basic rhythmic structure of a verse or lines in verse. Many traditional verse forms prescribe a specific verse metre, or a certain set of metres alternating in a particular order. The study of metres and forms of versification is known as prosody...

 of this poem is hendecasyllabic, a common form in Catullus' poetry.

17th Century translations

A rhyming translation was written in 1601 by the 17th century English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 composer

Composer

A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

, poet

Poet

A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...

 and physician

Physician

A physician is a health care provider who practices the profession of medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring human health through the study, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, injury and other physical and mental impairments...

 Thomas Campion

Thomas Campion

Thomas Campion was an English composer, poet and physician. He wrote over a hundred lute songs; masques for dancing, and an authoritative technical treatise on music.-Life:...

, which adds the word "sweetest"

My sweetest Lesbia, let us live and love;

And though the sager sort our deeds reprove,

Let us not weigh them. Heaven's great lamps do dive

Into their west, and straight again revive,

But soon as once is set our little light,

Then must we sleep one ever-during night.

Soon thereafter, Sir Walter Raleigh

Walter Raleigh

Sir Walter Raleigh was an English aristocrat, writer, poet, soldier, courtier, spy, and explorer. He is also well known for popularising tobacco in England....

 included the following verses in his The Historie of the World, which he wrote while imprisoned in the Tower of London

Tower of London

Her Majesty's Royal Palace and Fortress, more commonly known as the Tower of London, is a historic castle on the north bank of the River Thames in central London, England. It lies within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, separated from the eastern edge of the City of London by the open space...

The Sunne may set and rise

But we contrariwise

Sleepe after our short light

One everlasting night.

A free-verse translation of the following Latin text:

Let us live, my Lesbia, and love.

As for all the rumors of those stern old men,

Let us value them at a mere penny.

Suns may set and yet rise again, but

Us, with our brief light, can set but once.

The night which falls is one never-ending sleep.

Give me a thousand kisses, then a hundred.

Then, another thousand, and a second hundred.

Then, yet another thousand, and a hundred.

Then, when we have counted up many thousands,

Let us shake the abacus, so that no one may know the number,

And become jealous when they see

How many kisses we have shared.

Latin text

Line

Roman Senate Roman Senate The Senate of the Roman Republic was a political institution in the ancient Roman Republic, however, it was not an elected body, but one whose members were appointed by the consuls, and later by the censors. After a magistrate served his term in office, it usually was followed with automatic... , as it was believed that Catullus Catullus Gaius Valerius Catullus was a Latin poet of the Republican period. His surviving works are still read widely, and continue to influence poetry and other forms of art.-Biography:...  was having an affair with a senator's wife, known as Clodia Pulchra Tercia. This is also thought to be the woman Lesbia Lesbia Lesbia was the literary pseudonym of the great love of Roman poet Gaius Valerius Catullus .She was a poet in her own right, included with Catullus in a list of famous poets whose lovers "often" helped them write their verses....  in his poetry. Catullus is urging Clodia to disregard what people are saying about them, so she can spend more time with him. There is also a chiasmus Chiasmus In rhetoric, chiasmus is the figure of speech in which two or more clauses are related to each other through a reversal of structures in order to make a larger point; that is, the clauses display inverted parallelism...  in these lines: rumoresque senum severiorum omnes A B B A Poetic effects Line 5-6 The position of lux - light, and nox - night right next to each other serve to emphasise his two comparisons. Symbolically, the "perpetual night" represents death and the "brief light" represents life. Furthermore, there is also a second chiasmus Chiasmus In rhetoric, chiasmus is the figure of speech in which two or more clauses are related to each other through a reversal of structures in order to make a larger point; that is, the clauses display inverted parallelism...  in these lines: brevis lux nox perpetua A B B A Allusions in modern culture A modern version of this poem is sung in the 1998 French film Jeanne et le garçon formidable {Jeanne and the Perfect Guy} starring Virginie Ledoyen Virginie Ledoyen Virginie Fernandez , known by her stage name Virginie Ledoyen, is a French actress.-Life and career:She was born in Aubervilliers, Paris, the daughter of Olga, a restaurateur, and Bernard Fernandez, a merchant who sold cleaning products. Her paternal grandfather was Spanish...  and Mathieu Demy Mathieu Demy Mathieu Demy is a French actor and director, born 15 October 1972 in Paris. He is the son of Agnès Varda and Jacques Demy.- Filmography :*1988 : Kung-Fu Master*1993 : À la belle étoile with Julie Gayet, Chiara Mastroianni... . This poem is referenced in Vladimir Nabokov Vladimir Nabokov Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a multilingual Russian novelist and short story writer. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist... 's Lolita Lolita Lolita is a novel by Vladimir Nabokov, first written in English and published in 1955 in Paris and 1958 in New York, and later translated by the author into Russian... , according to annotator Alfred Appel, Jr.'s annotation. The line nox est una dormienda is a recurring theme in Anthony Burgess Anthony Burgess John Burgess Wilson  – who published under the pen name Anthony Burgess – was an English author, poet, playwright, composer, linguist, translator and critic. The dystopian satire A Clockwork Orange is Burgess's most famous novel, though he dismissed it as one of his lesser works... 's novel The Kingdom of the Wicked. Nox Dormienda is the name of a novel by Kelli Stanley Kelli Stanley Kelli Stanley is an American author of mystery-thrillers. Her first novel, Nox Dormienda was the first of a series set in Roman Britain in the 1st century CE .Nox Dormienda takes its title from a line by the Roman poet Catullus in the poem known as Catullus 5... . The line nox est perpetua una dormienda is quoted in the 'Present Day' chapter of Virginia Woolf Virginia Woolf Adeline Virginia Woolf was an English author, essayist, publisher, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century.... 's The Years The Years The Years is a 1937 novel by Virginia Woolf, the last she published in her lifetime. It traces the history of the genteel Pargiter family from the 1880s to the "present day" of the mid-1930s.... . Mike Engleby translates this poem as part of his entrance exam to Chatfield in Sebastian Faulks Sebastian Faulks -Early life:Faulks was born on 20 April 1953 in Donnington, Berkshire to Peter Faulks and Pamela . Edward Faulks, Baron Faulks, is his older brother. He was educated at Elstree School, Reading and went on to Wellington College, Berkshire... ' novel Engleby Engleby Engleby is a novel by the author Sebastian Faulks. - External links :* * The Independent, 18 May 2007, 'Sad lad, or mad lad?' * The Guardian, May 8, 2007, The digested read: Engleby by Sebastian Faulks... . This poem and its translation by Richard Cranshaw is referenced in the Diana Gabaldon Diana Gabaldon Diana J. Gabaldon is an American author of Mexican-American and English ancestry. Gabaldon is the author of the Outlander Series. Her books they contain elements of romantic fiction, historical fiction, mystery, adventure, and science fiction.-Early life and science career:Diana J. Gabaldon was...  novel Outlander Outlander (novel) Outlander is the first novel in a series of seven by Diana Gabaldon. The book focuses on two main characters, Claire Randall and James Alexander Malcolm MacKenzie Fraser, and takes place in 18th- and 20th-century Scotland... . The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL. Silverdale Interactive © 2024. All Rights Reserved.   x OK