Hector's Farewell by Friedrich Schiller
Translation
Andromache
Hector, are you now forever leaving
Me to venture where Achilles, weeping,
Piles dire hecatombs for Patroclus?
Who will teach your dear child how to hurl pikes,
Or to honor gods amid Troy’s great fights,
When you’re swallowed by shady Orcus?
Hector
Please, hold back your tears, Andromache dearest;
Battlefields now call out with fiery shrieks—
To prevent the spill of Pergamus’ blood.
Braving all for the gods of our homeland
And to save fair Ilium’s heroic band,
Gladly will I enter the Stygian flood.
Andromache
Never will I hear your clashing arms,
Your glaive will stand idly in our halls,
Priam’s race of heroes will be dust.
To the land of permanent eclipses,
Where in deserts flows weeping Cocytus,
There, in Lethe will our love be lost.
Hector
Although all my dreams and hopes must perish
In the quiet floods of Lethe’s waters—
Our love, dear, can never die.
Hear the savage raging under our spires:
Gird my sword, hold back your tears—remember:
Hector’s love in Lethe cannot die.
Translation © David B. Gosselin
Hektor und Andromache
Andromache
Will sich Hektor ewig von mir wenden,
Wo Achill mit den unnahbarn Händen
Dem Patroklus schrecklich Opfer bringt?
Wer wird künftig deinen Kleinen lehren
Speere werfen und die Götter ehren,
Wenn der finstre Orkus dich verschlingt?
Hektor
Teures Weib, gebiete deinen Tränen,
Nach der Feldschlacht ist mein feurig Sehnen,
Diese Arme schützen Pergamus.
Kämpfend für den heilgen Herd der Götter
Fall ich, und des Vaterlandes Retter
Steig ich nieder zu dem stygschen Fluß.
Andromache
Nimmer lausch ich deiner Waffen Schalle,
Müßig liegt dein Eisen in der Halle,
Priams großer Heldenstamm verdirbt.
Du wirst hingehn, wo kein Tag mehr scheinet,
Der Cocytus durch die Wüsten weinet,
Deine Liebe in dem Lethe stirbt.
Hektor
All mein Sehnen will ich, all mein Denken
In des Lethe stillen Strom versenken,
Aber meine Liebe nicht.
Horch! der Wilde tobt schon an den Mauern,
Gürte mir das Schwert um, laß das Trauern,
Hektors Liebe stirbt im Lethe nicht.
Listen to Frans Schubert’s setting of Schiller’s poem.
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Dave, I think "Hector's Farewell" is one of your best translations. I would be glad to publish it, if you email it to me. Bravo!
Love poems in war settings can be very moving, and this farewell fragment from the dialogue between Hector and Andromache, during the Tojan wars, feels so tragic and real because she forsees that he will die in Lethe. But, despite this - despite the fact that Achilles will slay him - what is stressed here is that their love won't perish. This is a really fine translation, David. You and Schiller are always a good match.