The Well Read Poem: S15E6: “Happy the Man, Who, Like Ulysses” by Joachim du Bellay trans. by Richard Wilbur

For this fifteenth season of the Well Read Poem, we are reading six poems in translation, written by a variety of ancient and modern poets. We hope that our discussion of these poems will be both interesting and instructive to anyone with an interest in literary translation as an art, and that it will serve to introduce you to a few poets whose acquaintance you have yet to make.

Today's poem is “Happy the Man, Who Like Ulysses” by Joachim du Bellay translated by Richard Wilbur. Poem begins at timestamps 6:11 (in French) and 7:19 (in English).

Heureux qui, comme Ulysse

Heureux qui, comme Ulysse, a fait un beau voyage,
Ou comme cestuy-là qui conquit la toison,
Et puis est retourné, plein d’usage et raison,
Vivre entre ses parents le reste de son âge !

Quand reverrai-je, hélas, de mon petit village
Fumer la cheminée, et en quelle saison
Reverrai-je le clos de ma pauvre maison,
Qui m’est une province, et beaucoup davantage ?

Plus me plaît le séjour qu’ont bâti mes aïeux,
Que des palais Romains le front audacieux,
Plus que le marbre dur me plaît l’ardoise fine :

Plus mon Loir gaulois, que le Tibre latin,
Plus mon petit Liré, que le mont Palatin,
Et plus que l’air marin la doulceur angevine.

Happy the Man, Who, Like Ulysses

trans. Richard Wilbur

Happy the man who, journeying far and wide
As Jason or Ulysses did, can then
Turn homeward, seasoned in the ways of men,
And claim his own, and there in peace abide!

When shall I see the chimney-smoke divide
The sky above my little town: ah, when
Stroll the small gardens of that house again
Which is my realm and crown, and more beside?

Better I love the plain, secluded home
My fathers built, than bold façades of Rome;
Slate pleases me as marble cannot do;

Better than Tiber's flood my quiet Loire,
Those little hills than these, and dearer far
Than great sea winds the zephyrs of Anjou.