We know the Greek poet Meleagros by his Latinized name Meleager, and under this name classical scholars recognize not only a fine lyric poet, but also the compiler of the first major anthology of Greek lyric poems, epigrams and fragments. Because he was proud or vain enough to pack the anthology with his own works, we have enough to get a sense of his life and passions. And passions he had in abundance.
We do not know when Meleager was born, or when he died, only that he wrote his works in the first century BCE. The landmark anthology he edited, the Stephanos (or “garland”), was completed no later than 60 BCE. The poet was born far from the Hellenic world’s literary center, in Gadara (now Umm Qais in present-day Jordan). He spent his school years and middle life in Tyre (in present-day Lebanon), emigrating not quite to the Greek motherland, but to the Aegean island of Kos, where he spent his last years as a grateful resident.
Reading the poems scattered at random through The Greek Anthology, whose initial kernel of poems Meleager himself compiled, one perceives this fine poet only in fragments, a broken mirror. Assembled together, however, the works form a self-portrait of a man swept from one fervent attachment to another. For Greeks of his era, the worship of beauty, and attaining possession of the beloved, were daily pursuits for all who had the leisure and taste to do so.
Two women claim Meleager’s deepest love. Heliodora, literate, accomplished, was probably a hetaira, one of that class of independent, unmarried women who mingled freely with men. She is Meleager’s great love, but she is scandalously unfaithful, so he takes comfort in the arms of a second woman, Zenophila. This lesser mistress, equally unfaithful, seems not too bright despite her wonderful singing voice. Meleager’s insecurity, jealousy, and sarcasm make his love poems true to life in any era. Any of us who have gone through adolescent obsessive crushes will recognize the emotions and language. When, some years later, Meleager learns of Heliodora’s death, his lament for her is a touching elegy and a cry of grief.
The most common theme in the love poems is Meleager’s claim that men and women have no control over whom they love, and that physical desire is almost indistinguishable from love to those under its sway. The pop psychology of the day, an inverted introspection, personifies desire as an external force. Aphrodite and Eros are literal characters in everyday life, and go about compelling people to pursue one another in a state of near-possession. Eros/Cupid, sometimes a mischievous child, and at other times an alluring young man, is a two-faced demigod. While Eros with his bow and arrow can make men and women desire one another, he is just as inclined to make Greek men fall in love with idling young men, all too willing to play the game. Sex is a sport for gods and men, utterly divorced from the workaday world of marriage, property, and the begetting of children.
Indeed, for Meleager, after the disasters with Heliodora and Zenophila, he seems to have spent the rest of his days writing about, if not sleeping with, dozens of beautiful young men. I caution readers not to mistake these affections, whether they were consummated or not, and in what manner, for pedophilia. My distinct impression is that the ephebes, upper-class young men between seventeen and twenty years of age, with their characteristic costume and cap, the chlamys and petasos — the ancient equivalent of T-shirts, jeans, and baseball caps — were regarded as adults, engaged in studies, athletics, and military exercises. These were the customs throughout the Hellenic world. Sexual preference overall was a subject of humor, but was ultimately a matter of taste.
Other poems of Meleager shed light on Greek myth, and the Greek world-view, in which short and sometimes brutal life ends for all in the cold darkness of Hades. The beautiful died young, or drowned at sea. Ghosts complained of the dark afterlife. Meleager narrates these gloomy outcomes, and expects no special reward below for having been a servant of the Muse. He earns our admiration for his honesty about himself, and for his essential goodness. He may be a lunatic for love, but he is an ethical lunatic, never cruel. Lied to, he does not lie. Deceived, he sheds light on all.
Among the more literary poems here are his introductory prologue to the original Greek Anthology and its poets; the messenger’s speech bringing bad news for Queen Niobe of Thebes; and a beautiful tribute to Spring, a work that anticipates Virgil. I have included a sufficient number of these other poems to demonstrate that Meleager was more than a “confessional” poet.
From Meleager’s 134 extant epigrams and short poems, I have chosen 70 for this poem cycle, in which I adapt, combine, and expand upon the originals. These adaptations and (sometimes) expansions are not a word-for-word translation. I claim the privilege of meeting Meleager poet-to-poet, his words and thoughts rendered in my manner, his rowdy Hellenic world akin to my New York City of the 1970s. One poem here, “Go To Elysium” is an invention “in the manner” of Meleager. If I have succeeded here, a reading of this collection will bring this timeless Greek back to life. He reminds you of yourself, or of some friend you know who is always in love, tossed this way and that by Eros. Like all great poets, Meleager is of his time, and for all time.
For the new book, By Night and Lamp: The World of Meleager.
