If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho QUOTES

2 " their heart grew cold
they let their wings down "

― Sappho , If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho

4 " ]Sardis
often turning her thoughts here

]
you like a goddess
and in your song most of all she rejoiced.

But now she is conspicuous among Lydian women
as sometimes at sunset
the rosyfingered moon

surpasses all the stars. And her light
stretches over salt sea
equally and flowerdeep fields.

And the beautiful dew is poured out
and roses bloom and frail
chervil and flowering sweetclover.

But she goes back and forth remembering
gentle Atthis and in longing
she bites her tender mind "

― Sappho , If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho

6 " Someone will remember us
I say
Even in another time "

― Sappho , If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho

8 " I emphasize the distinction between brackets and no brackets because it will affect your reading experience, if you will allow it. Brackets are exciting. Even though you are approaching Sappho in translation, that is no reason you should miss the drama of trying to read a papyrus torn in half or riddled with holes or smaller than a postage stamp--brackets imply a free space of imaginal adventure. "

― Sappho , If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho

10 " ]
]you will remember
]for we in our youth
did these things

yes many and beautiful things
]
]
] "

― Sappho , If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho

12 " Eros the melter of limbs (now again) stirs me -
sweetbitter unmanageable creature who steals in "

― Sappho , If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho

14 " frequently
for those
I treat well are the ones who most of all
harm me "

― Sappho , If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho

16 " I like to think that, the more I stand out of the way, the more Sappho shows through. This is an amiable fantasy (transparency of self) within which most translators labor. If light appears,

'not ruining the eyes (as Sappho says)
but strengthening, nourishing and watering,'
- Aelius Aristides Orations

we undo a bit of cloth. "

― Anne Carson , If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho

18 " I want to say something but shame
prevents me

yet if you had a desire for good or beautiful things
and your tongue were not concocting some evil to say,
shame would not hold down your eyes
but rather you would speak about what is just "

― Sappho , If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho

20 " someone will remember us
I say
even in another time "

― Sappho , If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho