Zukofsky, Louis (Vol. 11) - Burton Raffel
BURTON RAFFEL
As Zukofsky notes in his preface [to Catullus], it is the sound of the Latin which has come to interest him—not however as Latin sound, but as a challenge, a kind of dare. He has done what he said he would do, namely construct Latin sounds in English. It works, in Catullus 8; though the effect is somehow strange, it is more than acceptable. (p. 439)
Who we favor—whom—put to us? Caeli, tibby: now to your
(know bees?)
perspective egregious "best" unique ah me kitty ah,
come wasting on my eyes t'her reared at flame my medulla's
Seize fay licks, Caeli, see as in and more potence.
This is Catullus 100—but is it English? (I do not mean: is it poetry? If it is not English, then it is not a translation into English. Period.)… I'm told, reliably, that English schoolboys do this sort of thing all the time. Zukofsky...
[The entire page is 801 words long]
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