898. EBB to Hugh Stuart Boyd
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 5, 209–210.
[London]
Wednesday– [12 January 1842] [1]
My dear friend,
Thank you, thank you, for your kind suggestion & advice altogether. I had just (when your note arrived) finished two hymns of Synesius, one being the seventh & the other the ninth. Oh! I do remember that you performed upon the latter, [2] & my modesty shd have certainly bid me ‘avaunt’ [3] from it. Nevertheless it is so fine .. so prominent in the first class of Synesius’s beauties,—that I took courage & dismissed my scruples, & have produced a version which I have not compared to yours at all hitherto, but which probably is much rougher & rather closer!—winning in faith what it loses in elegance! ‘Elegance’ is’nt a word for me you know, generally speaking. The barbarians herd with me, “by two and three”. [4]
I had a letter today from Mr Dilke who agrees to everything—closes with the idea about ‘Christian greek poets’—(only begging me to keep away from theology—) & suggesting a subsequent reviewal of English poetical literature, from Chaucer down to our times. [5] Well—but the Greek poets. With all your kindness, I have scarcely sufficient materials for a full & minute survey of them. I have won a sight of the Poætæ Christiani [6] —but the price is ruinous—fourteen guineas—and then the work consists almost entirely of Latin poets—deducting Gregory & Nonnus, and John Damascenus [7] & a cento from Homer by somebody or other– Turning the leaves rapidly I do not see much else—& you know I may get a separate copy of John Dam, & have access to the rest. Try to turn in your head what I shd do. Greg. Nyssen did not write poems—did he? Have I a chance of seeing your copy of Mr Clarke’s book? It wd be useful in the matter of chronology. [8]
I humbly beg your pardon & Gregory’s, for the insolence of my note. It was as brief as it could be, & did not admit of any extended reference & admiration to his qualities as an orator. But whoever read it to you shd have explained that when I wrote “He was an orator,” the word orator was marked emphatically, so as to appear printed in capital letters of emphasis. [9] Do not say “you chose”, “you chose”. I did’nt & dont choose to be obstinate indeed—but I can’t see the sense of that ‘heavenly soul.’ [10]
Ever your grateful & affecte
EBB
I shall have room for praising Gregory in these papers.
Address: H S Boyd Esqr / Downshire Hill / Hampstead.
Publication: LEBB, I, 96–98.
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. The letter is postmarked 13 January 1842, a Thursday.
2. Boyd’s translation of the ninth ode was included in his Select Poems of Synesius and Gregory Nazianzen (1814). EBB’s version appeared in the third of her papers on the Greek Christian Poets (The Athenæum, 12 March 1842, no. 750, pp. 229–231), with her acknowledgement that it was “closer if less graceful and polished than Mr. Boyd’s”.
3. Macbeth, III, 4, 92.
4. Cf. Matthew, 18:20.
5. EBB’s detailed commentary on The Book of the Poets appeared in five numbers of The Athenæum, commencing with the issue of 4 June 1842.
6. Poetæ Græci Christiani, una cum Homericus Centonibus (1609).
7. Johannes Damascenus, one of the Greek Fathers of the Church, wrote a hymn on the subject of Christ’s birth. EBB referred to him in her third paper.
8. See letter 894, note 5.
9. For EBB’s comments on Gregory, see letter 894, note 1.
10. Paradise Lost, VI, 165.
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