IV. le malade. – André Chénier
M. Dezeimeris (Leçons nouvelles et remarques sur le texte de divers
auteurs, Bordeaux, 1879) has shown how much this poem owed to a Greek
versified romance by Theodoras Prodromus, entitled The Adventures of
Rhodanthe and Dosicles. To this very indifferent and cold production he
has traced both the scheme and most characteristic details of Chénier’s
Malade. We have deemed it unadvisable to crowd our notes with the
numerous passages of the Byzantine writer which have inspired our poet.
Ll. 1-3. This invocation, a litany in form, may have been suggested by
the Orphic hymn to Apollo.
L. 6. qui meurt abandonnée, i.e. qui meurt si elle est abandonnée.
L. 7. Qui n’a pas dû rester…, ‘who surely has not been spared by
death that she might see her own son die.’
Ll. 8, 9. Assoupis, assoupis… Frequent repetitions occur throughout
this piece, all with a most natural and pathetic effect. M. Dezeimeris
that Chénier took the hint from Prodromus, in whose poem, however, the
repetitions, for the most part irrelevant, are mere mannerism.
L. 15. un jeune taureau blanc. ‘Iuvencum candentem,’ Aen. ix. 627.
L. 22. Aen. x. 557.
Ll. 24, 25. Il. i. 362. Thetis says to Achilles; ‘Why weeps my son?
what grieves thee? Speak, conceal not what hath laid such hard hand on
thee, let both know.’–CHAPMAN.
L. 34. See tapes in A. Rich’s Dict. of Roman and Greek Antiq.
L. 36. ô douleurs! The s is required by the rhyme rather than by the
sense.
L. 43. Euripides, Hipp. 135.
L. 44. Sans connaître Cérès. ‘Non Cereris placuere dapes, non
pocula Bacchi’ is Gaulmin’s paraphrase of Prodromus (Paris, 1625). For a
similar use of ‘Ceres,’ see Ovid, Met. iii. 437. Milton has: ‘A field
Of Ceres ripe for harvest waving bends’ (Paradise Lost, iv. 980,
981); and Byron: ‘Beneath his ears of Ceres groan the roads’ (Don
Juan, XII. ix).
L. 46. ta vieille inconsolable mère, not ton inconsolable vieille
mère, which would be the more usual, but less forcible, order.
L. 48. T’asseyait sur son sein. Sein (bosom) here stands for giron
(lap). This is the Latin phrase in sinu. The English Bible reads (Luke
xvi. 23): ‘He (the rich man) seeth Abraham… and Lazarus in his bosom,’
whereas Langland, more explicit and accurate, says, ‘Ich sauh hym
[Lazarus] sitte… in Abraham’s lappe’ (P. Pl., C. ix, 283).
L. 53. presse de ta lèvre. She says this holding out the cup to him,
so that there is no need for her to express the word ‘cup,’ which is
therefore understood. Yet it appears that Chénier did not mean ll. 53,
54 to stand thus, as they are struck out in the MS. (Dezeimeris, p. 69).
Ll. 59, 60. sur leur jeune sein… leur robe. He says leur, as if
everybody ought to understand him, because his own thought is full of
them–those dancing fair ones mentioned in the following line. This, as
well as the preceding ‘presse’ and ‘la mienne’ higher up, is of those
true touches that carry us into the atmosphere of life.
L. 65. Reminiscences of Virgil, Ecl. v. 58; Georg. ii. 151.
L. 70. cette vierge dansante. The first editor had altered this into
‘cette vierge charmante,’ either because the epithet recurs at ll. 61,
89, or because he objected to this declension, or rather adjectival use,
of the past participle. For this syntactical feature see Darmesteter
et Hatzfeld, Le seizième siècle en France, §210; Haase, §91. See also
note to p. 62, l. 19.
L. 71. Pallas (Od. i. 58) represents Ulysses as longing to see ‘His
country’s smoke leap from her chimney tops.’–CHAPMAN.
L. 74. enchante ta vieillesse. An easy correction would be
enchantent, which would not spoil the metre, but, as a rule, Chénier
makes the verb agree with the last subject. See Ayer, §217.
Ll. 76, 77. Tibullus, i. 3. 8.
L. 80. Viendras-tu point…? The omission of ne in direct
interrogation, very frequent in the seventeenth century, is still to
be met with in modern poetry, e.g.: ‘Viendras-tu pas voir mes
ondines?’–V. Hugo, Ballades, 4. (Haase, §101 A.)
L. 84. Racine, Phèdre, I. iii: ‘Ariane, ma soeur, de quel amour
blessée…’
L. 93. Virgil, Ecl. vi. 21 ‘Aegle naiadum pulcherrima…’
L. 95. ne sera-ce point. A future of doubt.
L. 103. Ovid, Met. i. 481.
L. 105. garde que jamais elle soit… Ne was generally omitted in
the seventeenth century after expressions of fear and after garde,
gardez, prenez garde (Haase, §104 B).
L. 109. va la trouver. Cf. the first scene of the third act of
Racine’s Phèdre. The entire poem is to some extent the counterpart of
Racine’s play.
L. 126. d’âge chancelante. Cf. Aen. iv. 641.
L. 132. L’insensé. In the sense, Becq de Fouquières remarks, not of
demens, but of amens, as in Ovid, Am. iii II. 25.
