Talk:Lille Stesichorus

Reason for this article

This article should serve as a practical demonstration of a recurrent theme in classical literature articles – the extent to which papyrus discoveries are reshaping our understanding of classical authors and their works. So it should be linked to a wide range of articles. Few discoveries are bigger than this one and few have as many ramifications. McCnut (talk) 10:41, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

I'd like to ave a go at this meself, if you don't mind. I've got some stuff in me swag that looks right for it. It's what you make of it really. But strewth it's hot and no use trying to do everything at once! So I'll sit in the shade for a bit and get stuck in to the yakka after a bit of shuteye. Cheers for now! McOoee (talk) 09:07, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Pretty much finished now, I reckon. The article could do with a section summarising the poem, maybe even a translation/paraphrase, but that can wait another day. Meanwhile I've got other chores to do, like mending fences, chopping wood and of course brushing the flies off my old patriarch's face, as he sits on the veranda and stares at the world as if it weren't there, poor old bastard. I hope he's not dead but I haven't the heart to wake him out of it. And then there's the rain to pray for, which is a long job in itself, seeing how God is deaf to us poor sinners. McOoee (talk) 14:43, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Sitting on the veranda with the old patriarch, and having nothing better to do, I thought I might as well have a go at translating the fragment meself. And why not? The scholars only write prose translations and that makes the kookaburras laugh. As the galah said, when I asked him about it, "What could be more un-literal than a prose translation of verse!" But the wombat down by the creek gave me the best advice. "Treat every foot as unresolved, Bozo, because that will give you a fixed number of syllables per line, which is the quantity you are after, if you want to seem properly ancient. Then try to recreate the meter, but be as literal as you can. It's a juggling act." So I arst him, just for a lark, what would a wombat know about juggling? "You watch yourself, youngster!" he growled back. "Or some night I might knock your dunny down, with you in it!" McOoee (talk) 13:11, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

Course it aint Banjo Patterson, or anywhere near as good, but it should give the average punter a peep into a very strange kettle of fish, which is the lyrical narrative. Wombat says the nearest thing to it is Spenser's Fairy Queen, whatever that is. I reckon it's like Aunty Sally, over round Laglan Station, singing about her groins, the rheumatism and my uncle Jack's wild ways, every time she's on the phone to Gramma Moses, like the washing on the line when the wind is up. It stays pegged but it dances like the devil, and so does Aunt Sally on the phone with all her whining, old Gramma Moses says. McOoee (talk) 14:18, 14 March 2012 (UTC) Which is to say: Stesichorus stays pegged to a story but dances around it, now high, now low, heavy and limp like a towel, or fluttering madly like Aunt Sally's knickers, depending on what the wind of inspiration sets him a-doing with whatever mood he's in. McOoee (talk) 01:23, 18 March 2012 (UTC)