„Ich liebe und hasse zugleich. Wie das möglich ist, fragst Du? // Ich weiß nicht wie, doch ich fühle es mit höllischer Qual.“
— Catull
Gedichte Catulls (Carmina Catulli), Gedicht 85
Zitate von Catull
6 2
Catull
Geburtstag: 84 v.Chr
Todesdatum: 54 v.Chr
Andere Namen: Catullus, Catullus Gaius Valerius, Гай Валерий Катулл
Gaius Valerius Catullus war ein römischer Dichter des 1. Jahrhunderts v. Chr. Er stammte aus Verona. Catull gehörte zum Kreis der Neoteriker und orientierte sich wie diese vor allem an dem berühmten hellenistischen Dichter Kallimachos. Aber auch die griechische Dichterin Sappho hatte einen großen Einfluss auf ihn. Seine carmina wurden unter anderem von Carl Orff vertont.
Zitate Catull
„Was eine Frau dem begehrenden Geliebten sagt, ist wie in Wind und reißendes Wasser geschrieben.“
— Catull
Gedichte Catulls (Carmina Catulli), Gedicht 70,3-4
„Nichts ist alberner als albernes Lachen.“
— Catull
Gedichte Catulls (Carmina Catulli), Gedicht 39,16; an Egnatius
„Der ehrbare Dichter muss keusch sein, seine Verse jedoch nicht.“
— Catull
Gedichte Catulls (Carmina Catulli), Gedicht 16,5-6; an Aurelius und Furius
„Was können die Götter besseres geben als eine glückliche Stunde?“
— Catull
Gedichte Catulls (Carmina Catulli), Gedicht 62,30; hexametrisches Hochzeitsgedicht
„Eine Liebe, die seit langem besteht, gibt man nicht leicht auf.“
— Catull
Gedichte Catulls (Carmina Catulli), Gedicht 76,13; an die Götter
„Idleness ere now has ruined both kings and wealthy cities.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
LI, last lines
Carmina
Original: (la) Otium et reges prius et beatas
perdidit urbes.
„Suns may set and rise again. For us, when the short light has once set, remains to be slept the sleep of one unbroken night.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
V, lines 1–6
Thomas Campion's translation:
My sweetest Lesbia, let us live and love;
And though the sager sort our deeds reprove,
Let us not weigh them: Heaven's great lamps do dive
Into their west, and straight again revive,
But, soon as once set is our little light,
Then must we sleep one ever-during night.
From A Book of Airs (1601)
Carmina
Original: (la) Vivamus, mea Lesbia, atque amemus<br/>rumoresque senum severiorum<br/>omnes unius aestimemus assis
soles occidere et redire possunt:
nobis cum semel occidit brevis lux,
nox est perpetua una dormienda.
Kontext: Let us live, my Lesbia, and love, and value at one farthing all the talk of crabbed old men. Suns may set and rise again. For us, when the short light has once set, remains to be slept the sleep of one unbroken night.
„Ah, what is more blessed than to put cares away, when the mind lays by its burden, and tired with labour of far travel we have come to our own home and rest on the couch we longed for? This it is which alone is worth all these toils.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
XXXI, lines 7–11
Carmina
Original: (la) O quid solutis est beatius curis,
cum mens onus reponit, ac peregrino
labore fessi venimus larem ad nostrum,
desideratoque acquiescimus lecto?
hoc est quod unum est pro laboribus tantis.
„Wandering through many countries and over many seas I come, my brother, to these sorrowful obsequies, to present you with the last guerdon of death, and speak, though in vain, to your silent ashes, since fortune has taken your own self away from me—alas, my brother, so cruelly torn from me! Yet now meanwhile take these offerings, which by the custom of our fathers have been handed down—a sorrowful tribute—for a funeral sacrifice; take them, wet with many tears of a brother, and for ever, my brother, hail and farewell!“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
CI, lines 1–10
Sir William Marris's translation:
By many lands and over many a wave
I come, my brother, to your piteous grave,
To bring you the last offering in death
And o'er dumb dust expend an idle breath;
For fate has torn your living self from me,
And snatched you, brother, O, how cruelly!
Yet take these gifts, brought as our fathers bade
For sorrow's tribute to the passing shade;
A brother's tears have wet them o'er and o'er;
And so, my brother, hail, and farewell evermore!
Carmina
Original: (la) Multas per gentes et multa per aequora vectus
Advenio has miseras, frater, ad inferias,
Ut te postremo donarem munere mortis
Et mutam nequiquam alloquerer cinerem.
Quandoquidem fortuna mihi tete abstulit ipsum,
Heu miser indigne frater adempte mihi,
Nunc tamen interea haec prisco quae more parentum
Tradita sunt tristi munere ad inferias,
Accipe fraterno multum manantia fletu,
Atque in perpetuum, frater, ave atque vale.
„He seems to me to be equal to a god, he, if it may be, seems to surpass the very gods, who sitting opposite thee again and again gazes at thee and hears thee sweetly laughing.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
LI, lines 1–5. Cf. Sappho 31.
Carmina
Original: (la) Ille mi par esse Deo videtur,
ille, si fas est, superare Divos,
qui sedens adversus identidem te
spectat et audit
dulce ridentem.
„Henceforth let no woman believe a man's oath, let none believe that a man's speeches can be trustworthy. They, while their mind desires something and longs eagerly to gain it, nothing fear to swear, nothing spare to promise; but as soon as the lust of their greedy mind is satisfied, they fear not then their words, they heed not their perjuries.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
LXIV
Carmina
Original: (la) Nunc iam nulla viro iuranti femina credat,
nulla viri speret sermones esse fideles;
quis dum aliquid cupiens animus praegestit apisci,
nil metuunt iurare, nihil promittere parcunt:
sed simul ac cupidae mentis satiata libido est,
dicta nihil metuere, nihil periuria curant.
„If anything ever happened to any one who eagerly longed and never hoped, that is a true pleasure to the mind.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
CVII, lines 1–2
Carmina
Original: (la) Si quicquam cupido optantique optigit umquam
insperanti, hoc est gratum animo proprie.
„What is given by the gods more desirable than the fortunate hour?“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
LXII
Carmina
Original: (la) Quid datur a divis felici optatius hora?
„What he himself is, whether he is or is not, he does not know so much as this.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
XVII, line 22
Carmina
Original: (la) Ipse qui sit, utrum sit an non sit, id quoque nescit.
„If a man can take any pleasure in recalling the thought of kindnesses done.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
LXXVI, lines 1–2
Carmina
Original: (la) Siqua recordanti benefacta priora voluptas
Est homini.
„To this point is my mind reduced by your fault, Lesbia, and has so ruined itself by its own devotion, that now it can neither wish you well though you should become the best of women, nor cease to love you though you do the worst that can be done.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
LXXV, lines 1–4
Carmina
Original: (la) Huc est mens deducta tua mea, Lesbia, culpa
atque ita se officio perdidit ipsa suo,
ut iam nec bene velle queat tibi, si optima fias,
nec desistere amare, omnia si facias.
„All right and wrong, confounded in impious madness, turned from us the righteous will of the gods.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
LXIV
Carmina
Original: (la) Omnia fanda nefanda malo permixta furore
iustificam nobis mentem avertere deorum.
„What a woman says to her ardent lover should be written in wind and running water.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
Mulier cupido quod dicit amanti
in vento et rapida scribere oportet aqua.
LXX, lines 3–4. Compare Keats' epitaph: "Here lies one whose name was writ in water."
Carmina
Original: (la) Mulier cupido quod dicit amanti
in vento et rapida scribere oportet aqua.
„I hate and love. Why I do so, perhaps you ask. I know not, but I feel it, and I am in torment.“
— Gaio Valerio Catullo, list of poems by Catullus
Odi et amo. quare id faciam, fortasse requiris.
nescio, sed fieri sentio et excrucior.
LXXXV, lines 1–2
Carmina
Original: (la) Odi et amo. quare id faciam, fortasse requiris.
nescio, sed fieri sentio et excrucior.
