Romantic Age in Sándor petöfi’s poetry and giuseppe verdi’s music

SÁNDOR PETÖFI’s poems are

translated to English by Asya Lazar Ardova

Listen to the soundtrack “Verdi’s Romantic Hero”   performed by Asya Lazar Ardova (piano) on the page ardSOUND  of ardisonata.net.

…Oh, how handsome are the soldiers of freedom,

Let them be fortunate, oh God, and let them be…

Sándor Petöfi.“Italy”

The middle of the 19^th century was mutinous time for Europe.

The struggle against tyranny, willfulness and obscurantism, partially evoked and inspirited by the men of culture and arts, gave birth to the type of the romantic hero, who manifested human dignity and freedom as the highest maxima of his life.

 

The great Italian composer Giuseppe Verdi (1813–1901) and glorious Hungarian poet SÁNDOR PETÖFI (1823–1849) are such progressive symbols of the 19^th century.

 

Giuseppe Verdi‘s passion was music, and his passionate music managed to fill Italian hearts with the spirit of freedom and independence of any possible oppressors.

Since 1853 and up to nowadays the opera “Il trovatore” stirs minds of the whole mankind with the arias of true romantic hero Manrico and the gypsy woman Asucena.

 

Sándor Petöfi seems to have come out of Verdi’s heroic operas. Most educated and romantic poet of Hungary’s struggle for independence Petőfi lived the life of a hero, doing it intentionally.

Flame of Hell and Horns of Devil!

Verses by Sándor Petőfi , translated to English by Asya Lazar ARDOVA

Flame of Hell and horns of devil!

Outraged mind — skeined and raveled.

I am rushing, I’m insane

As the Balaton in rain.

All my life is true misfortune!

Days are running — I am lurching.

If my eyes were those of lady,

I would cry out all the kerchiefs.

But my tears are not for sale!

Let the others cry out and wail.

And my armour is my brain,

And my word shall win my pain.

Such features as sense of humour, desperate bitter smile and self-analysis close to self-mockery are peculiar to Petofi.    

Oh, if I Wouldn’t Have Worn the Cap

Verses by Sándor Petőfi, translated to English by Asya Lazar ARDOVA

Oh, if I wouldn’t have worn the cap,

That looks a bit like shabby tap,

I would have been the lad of dream —

The gentleman I would have been.

And if my fashionable jack

Were not so ragged as to crack,

I would have been the lad of dream —

The gentleman I would have been.

And if my coat had a twin

For winter’s white and summer’s green,

I would have been the lad of dream —

The gentleman I would have been.

And if my breeches were not fringy,

When patches make my back feel stingy,

I would have been the lad of dream —

The gentleman I would have been.

And if my boots were firm and sound,

For sense of firm and steady ground,

I would have been the lad of dream —

The gentleman I would have been.

 

And if these if and would, and when

Were damned forever and again,

I would have been the lad of dream —

The gentleman I would have been.

Meanwhile, the spirit of freedom was not just some vague objective for the young singer of independence. Petőfi is against obscurantism, meanwhile his revolutionary mind greets progressive ideas, like, for example, the first railway.

To the Railway

Verses by Sándor Petőfi , translated to English by Asya Lazar ARDOVA

Waves of joy! And all I want

Is to love this hasty pleasure,

When the bird feels every measure,

And I fly in happy jaunt.

Oh, the longest ways of mind,

Motions of soul in my head,

We shall reach and leave behind

Our horse, whose race is mad.

Forest, brook, this ridge and ravine,

Cottage, stranger, what’s afar?

Everything is flown and sailing

To the space and to the star.

Look, the Sun is reaching us —

It’s escaping from the devils:

They are near, but he travels

In the sky — so bright and fast.

How tired it is! Oh, God!

What a pity! It’s exhausted,

Leaning on the mounds a-coasted,

Plunging to the land of Nod…

Fly, my steed, like crazy bird,

And the steam-machine is anxious,

Lo! The way is getting spacious

As to reach the other world.

Oh, the builder, make these ways —

Hundreds, thousands of them!

They are muscles making trace,

Let the Earth be their stem.

Feel the muscles of the Earth

With their high predestination,

Juice of love and education

Have acquired their birth.

How long’re you building this?

Was it, but the lack of metal?

Break your chains, while they rattle —

Here’s the metal to you, please!