Acts of Love: Ancient Greek Poetry from Aphrodite's Garden.

Acts of Love: Ancient Greek Poetry from Aphrodite's Garden, translated by George Economou, Modern Library, 2006, $13.95, cloth, ISBN 0679643281.

In its day, the ancient Greek symposium played a social role similar to that of the modern, upscale urban gala in that it was an occasion for members of high society to mix and mingle with their peers. To be sure, many of its arrangements were distinctly unmodern. No women were admitted, with the exception of "flute-girls." Attendees did not stand but reclined on couches arranged in a horseshoe. The Greek word symposion literally means "a drink together," and much attention was paid to the wine, which was cut with water carefully mixed with it in a bowl. And as for what actually transpired at these gatherings, the evidence is neither consistent nor clear. The way our literary sources describe it, the flute-girls were eventually dismissed so that the attendees could discuss civilized subjects like literature or recite poems. But if the scenes painted on ancient wine cups and mixing bowls are any indication, the flute-girls often stayed and the event devolved into a sex party. Somewhere between these two extremes was presumably a reality; and perhaps the best clue to that reality was the Greek erotic epigram, a short poem written for recitation at a symposium, in which literature and sex were united:

  Bring water, my boy, and bring wine,
  and bring me garlands of flowers.
  I'm ready for another bout with Love.

So Anacreon, as translated by George Economou in this lively new collection.

The epigram was the popular verse form in antiquity (and not restricted to erotic themes, either). The best poets made albums of their work, which they circulated among their peers, who copied what they liked, added favorite poems from other authors, and made their own albums to share, mixing and swapping poems like music files. These mixes were the first anthologiai; the term, which literally denotes a collection of flowers, can also be translated as a "garland," and evokes the original sympotic context (see Anacreon, above). A massive collection of Byzantine date called the Greek Anthology is the source from which most of Economou's epigrams have been taken.

The themes here are love and sex; that is to say, poems about love for the unattainable inamorata, poems about sex addressed to prostitutes, and poems about love and sex conjoined, addressed to almost every sort of human being. While the voices of Sappho and the less famous Nossis are heard here, it is male erotic love in all its different permutations that is the main focus: love of boys, of men, of mistresses and wives, of the soul and of the body. There is no prurience on show, but plenty of shame, humiliation, depression, ecstasy, and surprise. Who, after all, would expect the following brand of lovemaking to appear such a jolly, wholesome thing?

  When moved to make love to your pregnant wife,
  never bed her down face to face. For then
  you'll be riding a big wave, a bit frustrated
  trying to row her, being tossed and rolled yourself.
  Instead, turn her over and make merry
  with her rosy butt, instructing her in boy love.

These poems were not originally written to celebrate the variousness of sexual experience, but in the context of this collection, that is one central effect.

As diverting as these poems can be, the voice and style Economou has brought to bear on them renders this anthology even more compelling. Translatorese is largely banished; what remains is a familiar American poetic idiom, by turns colloquial and experimental. Typographical devices, such as the splicing of phrases in a sentence across three or four lines, are well handled, and some poems are translated as if they were song lyrics. Another technique that Economou occasionally uses is to give two or three different versions of the same poem. Here is an alternative rendering of the Anacreon quoted above:

  Waiter, a double Jack Daniel's on the rocks, please,
  and a dozen Wellfleet oysters on the half shell.
  I'm here to take on Love's next challenger.

A possible objection to this stylistic approach is that it makes the poetic voice too strong, too inflexible. This volume affords little sense of stylistic change, even as we read through a sequence whose earliest author, Sappho, was writing almost 1200 years before Paulos Silentarios, one of the last. In extenuation it might be noted that poets like Paulos were clearly attempting to imitate their archaic predecessors, and thought of themselves as heirs to a timeless poetic tradition. But if these translations are not as strange as those of, say, an Ezra Pound, they are nevertheless very much alive. It is high time that these sympotic epigrams were translated into the modern idiom of a country whose national anthem was originally a British officers' drinking song: Anacreon in heaven would be proud.