Here’s Basil Bunting’s version - an ‘overdraft’, not a strict translation - unpublished in his lifetime:
Like a fawn you dodge me, Molly,
a lost fawn.
A breath of wind scares her.
Leaves rustle, or a rabbit
stirs, and her heart flutters,
her knees quiver.
But it’s me chasing you, Molly,
not a tiger, not to tear you.
Let mother go,
you’re old enough for a man.
Thanks Harry! In an early draft of this post I included the Latin and in fact precisely this translation, but in the end I thought the piece was probably long enough already. Glad to have it in the comments though thank you.
I presented it with some trepidation - it isn’t exactly the cosiest of love poems!
By the by, I noticed that the Jonson IV.i - which I did not know, thank you - preserves the vocative ‘Ligurine’, making it look almost like a feminine ending/name. I was struck, in a reverse manner, by the gender ambiguity in Bunting’s ‘Molly’…
Yes, very many early modern translations of Horace do this -- make the erotic poems addressed to boys either ambiguous in their address or outright switch it to a female name. I don't read 'Molly' as ambiguous re: gender though, I've only ever heard it for a girl. Interesting that you did not have this impression. Odes 1.23 is indeed certainly not a cosy poem, I wouldn't personally describe it as a love poem at all, but then I wouldn't call *any* of Horace's erotic odes love poems to be honest. I think I wrote briefly before about the edge of predation which is quite marked in both Horace and Bunting's erotic verse.
Here’s Basil Bunting’s version - an ‘overdraft’, not a strict translation - unpublished in his lifetime:
Like a fawn you dodge me, Molly,
a lost fawn.
A breath of wind scares her.
Leaves rustle, or a rabbit
stirs, and her heart flutters,
her knees quiver.
But it’s me chasing you, Molly,
not a tiger, not to tear you.
Let mother go,
you’re old enough for a man.
Thanks Harry! In an early draft of this post I included the Latin and in fact precisely this translation, but in the end I thought the piece was probably long enough already. Glad to have it in the comments though thank you.
I presented it with some trepidation - it isn’t exactly the cosiest of love poems!
By the by, I noticed that the Jonson IV.i - which I did not know, thank you - preserves the vocative ‘Ligurine’, making it look almost like a feminine ending/name. I was struck, in a reverse manner, by the gender ambiguity in Bunting’s ‘Molly’…
Yes, very many early modern translations of Horace do this -- make the erotic poems addressed to boys either ambiguous in their address or outright switch it to a female name. I don't read 'Molly' as ambiguous re: gender though, I've only ever heard it for a girl. Interesting that you did not have this impression. Odes 1.23 is indeed certainly not a cosy poem, I wouldn't personally describe it as a love poem at all, but then I wouldn't call *any* of Horace's erotic odes love poems to be honest. I think I wrote briefly before about the edge of predation which is quite marked in both Horace and Bunting's erotic verse.
I have once seen it the other way round too -- a version of Horace Odes 4.11, to Phyllis, addressed to a male friend ('Phil'). Quite funny and tender!