Sweetbitter | A Sappho Podcast
By Ellie Brigida, Alyse Knorr & Leesa Charlotte
Sweetbitter | A Sappho PodcastMar 04, 2021
Bonus: Sappho, Enheduanna and the lesbian movement with Judy Grahn
am I not olden
olden olden it is unwanted.
wanting, wanting
am I not broken
stolen common
am I not crinkled cranky poison
am I not glinty-eyed and frozen
am I not aged
shaky glazing
am I not hazy
guarded craven
am I not only
stingy little
am I not simple
brittle spitting
was I not over
over ridden?
it is a long story
will you be proud to be my version?
it is unwritten.
writing, writing
am I not ancient
raging patient
am I not able
charming stable
was I not building
forming braving
was I not ruling
guiding naming
was I not brazen
crazy chosen
even the stones would do my bidding?
it is a long story
am I not proud to be your version?
it is unspoken.
speaking, speaking
am I not elder
berry
brandy
are you not wine before you find me in your own beaker?
- Slowly: a plainsong from an older woman to a younger woman
Judy Grahn
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod.
You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
12: Fragment 147
Someone will remember us
I say
even in another time
Translated by Carson.
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod.
You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
Our guests this episode were Chris Mason, Tracey Walters, Vanessa Stovall, Marguerite Johnson, Katherine Blouin and Usama Gad. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them on our website. You can read Vanessa's full article on WAP here.
11: Fragment 118
Come, divine lyre, speak to me
and sing!
Translated by Rayor.
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod.
You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
Our guests this episode were Jane Montgomery Griffiths, Jade Esteban Estrada, Aimee Suzara, Maya Herbsman and Vanessa Stovall. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them on our website. You can read Vanessa's (a lunar tune) here.
10: Fragment 4
]heart
]absolutely
]I can
]
]would be for me
]to shine in answer
]face
]
]having been stained
]
Translated by Carson.
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
Our guests this episode were Diane Rayor, Ian Oliver and Tracey Walters. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them on our website.
9: Fragment 31
To me it seems that man has the fortune
of gods, whoever sits beside you
and close, who listens to you
sweetly speaking
and laughing temptingly. My heart
flutters in my breast whenever
I quickly glance at you –
I can say nothing,
my tongue is broken. A delicate fire
runs under my skin, my eyes
see nothing, my ears roar,
cold sweat
rushes down me, trembling seizes me,
I am greener than grass.
To myself I seem
needing but little to die.
Yet all must be endured, since . . .
Translated by Rayor
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
Our guests this episode were Diane Rayor, Jane Montgomery Griffiths, Marguerite Johnson, Tracey Walters, Sandra Boehringer and translator Annie McCarthy. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them on our website.
8: Fragment 23
] of desire
]
] for when I look at you
] such a Hermione
] and to yellow haired Helen I liken you
]
] among mortal women, know this
] from every care
] you could release me
]
] dewy riverbanks
] to last all night long
] [
Translated by Carson
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
Our guests this episode were Chris Mason from Old Songs, Jane Montgomery Griffiths & Diane Rayor. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them on our website. Thank you this week to James Jones for lending us his deep-voice.
If you'd like to join us for our Women's History Month event, you can find the details on our site, or register here.
7: Fragment 2
Come to me from Krete to this holy temple,
here to your sweet apple grove,
altars smoking with
frankincense.
Cold water ripples through apple branches,
the whole place shadowed in roses,
from the murmuring leaves
deep sleep descends.
Where horses graze, the meadow blooms
spring flowers in the winds
breathe softly . . .
*
Here, Aphrodite, after gathering . . .
pour into cups nectar
lavishly mingled
with joys.
Translation by Rayor
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
Our guests this episode were Roberta Mazza, Marguerite Johnson, Malcolm Choat, Mike Sampson, Usama Gad & Katherine Blouin. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them on our website.
6: Fragment 58
You, children, be zealous for the beautiful gifts of the violetlapped Muses
and for the clear songloving lyre.
But my skin once soft is now taken by old age,
my hair turns white from black.
And my heart is weighed down and my knees do not lift,
that once were light to dance as fawns.
I groan for this. But what can I do?
A human being without old age is not a possibility.
There is the story of Tithonos, loved by Dawn with her arms of roses
and she carried him off to the ends of the earth
when he was beautiful and young. Even so was he gripped
by white old age. He still has his deathless wife.
Translation by Carson (2005)
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
You can read Carson’s thoughts on the 2004 discovery in the New York Review here. Roberta Mazza’s blog, Faces and Voices, can be found here.
Our guests this episode were Roberta Mazza, Sandra Boehringer (trans. by Annie McCarthy), Marguerite Johnson, Malcolm Choat, Mike Sampson & Ariel Sabar. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them on our website.
Holiday Special: Aphrodite with Liv Albert
Grab a drink and join us for a holiday bonus episode with our friend Liv Albert from Let’s Talk About Myths Baby. We talk about Aphrodite, Greek Mythology and the patriarchy.
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
You can find Let’s Talk About Myths Baby anywhere you find podcasts and on social media @mythsbaby.
5: Fragment 58 (pre-2004)
]
]
]
]
]running away
]bitten
]
]
]you
]makes a way with the mouth
]beautiful gifts children
]songdelighting clear sounding lyre
]all my skin old age already
hair turned white after black
]knees do not carry
]like fawns
]but what could I do?
]not possible to become
]Dawn with arms of roses
]bringing to the ends of the earth
]yet seized
]wife
]imagines
]might bestow
But I love delicacy and this to me—
the brilliance and beauty of the sun—desire has allotted.
Translation by Carson
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
If you want to know more about Eurocentrism in papyrology, please follow Usama’s blog: Everyday Orientalism. Ariel’s book Veritas: A Harvard Professor, a Con Man & the Gospel of Jesus’s Wife is out wherever you buy books - here’s it's listing our favorite local.
If you want to listen to another cool podcast all about the Hobby Lobby, check out the Behind the Bastards episode.
Our guests this episode were Malcolm Choat, Ariel Sabar, Mike Sampson & Usama Gad. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them here: https://sweetbitterpodcast.com/guests/
4: Fragment 55
When you lie dead, no one will remember you
For you have no share in the Muses’ roses.
No, flitting aimlessly about,
You will wildly roam,
a shade amidst the shadowy dead.
Translated by Dubnoff
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
Our guests this episode were Marguerite Johnson and Malcolm Choat. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them here: https://sweetbitterpodcast.com/guests/
3: Fragment 130
Once again Love, that loosener of limbs,
bittersweet and inescapable, crawling thing,
seizes me.
Translation by Rayor.
Rayor, Diane. Sappho: A New Translation of the Complete Works, Cambridge University Press, 2014. Introduction & notes by André Lardinois.
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter.
Our guests this episode were Marguerite Johnson, Alex Purves, Jade Esteban Estrada and Diane Rayor. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them here: https://sweetbitterpodcast.com/guests/
2: Fragment 94
I simply wish to die.
Weeping she left me.
and told me this, too:
We've suffered terribly, Sappho.
I leave you against my will.
I answered: Go happily
and remember me --
you know how we cared for you.
If not, let me remind you
*
. . . the lovely times we shared.
Many crowns of violets,
roses, and crocuses together
. . . you put on by my side
and many scented wreaths
woven from blossoms
around your delicate throat.
And . . . with pure, sweet oil
[for a queen] . . .
you anointed . . .
and on soft beds
. . . delicate . . .
you quenched your desire.
Not any . . .
no holy site . . .
we left uncovered,
no grove . . . dance
. . . sound
Translation by Rayor.
Rayor, Diane. Sappho: A New Translation of the Complete Works, Cambridge University Press, 2014. Introduction & notes by André Lardinois.
Thank you for listening! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter - sign up before November 1st at any level for a free Sweetbitter tote bag.
Our guests this episode were Marguerite Johnson, Jane Montgomery Griffiths, Sandra Boehringer (translation by Annie McCarthy) and Diane Rayor. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them here: https://sweetbitterpodcast.com/guests/
1: Fragment 16
Some men say and army of horses and some men say an army on foot
and some men say an army of ships is the most beautiful thing
on the black earth. But I say it is
what you love.
Easy to make this understood by all.
For she who overcame everyone
in beauty (Helen)
left her fine husband
behind and went sailing to Troy.
Not for her children nor her dear parents
had she a thought, no-
]led her astray
]for
]lightly
]reminded me now of Anaktoria
who is gone.
I would rather see her lovely step
and the motion of light on her face
than chariots of Lydians or ranks
of footsoldiers in arms
] not possible to happen
] to pay for a share
]
]
]
]
]
toward[
]
]
]
out of the unexpected.
Translation by Carson
Sappho, , and Anne Carson. If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho. , 2002.
Thank you for listening to our first episode! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter - sign up before November 1st at any level for a free Sweetbitter tote bag.
Our guests this episode were Chris Mason from Olds Songs, Marguerite Johnson and Diane Rayor. You can learn more about our guests and where to find them here: https://sweetbitterpodcast.com/guests/
0: Ode to Aphrodite
On the throne of many hues, Immortal Aphrodite,
child of Zeus, weaving wiles: I beg you,
do not break my spirit, O Queen,
with pain or sorrow
but come--if ever before from far away
you heard my voice and listened,
and leaving your father's
golden home you came,
your chariot yoked with lovely sparrows
drawing you quickly over the dark earth
in a whirling cloud of wings down
the sky through midair,
suddenly here. Blessed One, with a smile
on your deathless face, you ask
what have I suffered again
and why do I call again
and what in my wild heart do I most wish
would happen: "Once again who must I
persuade to turn back to your love?
Sappho, who wrongs you?
If now she flees, soon she'll chase.
If rejecting gifts, then she'll give.
If not loving, soon she'll love
even against her will."
Come to me now--release me from these
troubles, everything my heart longs
to have fulfilled, fulfill, and you
be my ally.
Translation by Rayor
Rayor, Diane. Sappho: A New Translation of the Complete Works, Cambridge University Press, 2014. Introduction & notes by André Lardinois.
Thank you for listening to our episode zero! You can follow us on Twitter & Instagram @sweetbitterpod. You can support us on patreon.com/sweetbitter - sign up before November 1st at any level for a free Sweetbitter tote bag.
Introducing
Welcome to Sweetbitter, a podcast where we investigate the truth and controversy surrounding Sappho her life, the Isle of Lesbos and her relevance today, Each episode we'll deep dive into a part of the mystery of Sappho with insights from academics, translators, performers, and poets.
Launching October 15th 2020. You can follow us on Twitter and Instagram @sweetbitterpod, or support us on Patreon.