Blog Post 3: Interpreting Sappho 18 and Alcman 6 in context of Eros the Bittersweet

Sappho 18:

Like the sweet apple that reddens on the highest bough, 

high on the highest bough, and the apple gatherers have forgotten it--

no, they have not forgotten it completely, but they could not reach it. 

Anne Carson's interpretation of the love and desire Sappho describes is centered around the simultaneous paradoxical experience of "sweetbitter". In Sappho 18, the metaphor of apple picking is exemplary of this phenomena. The 'sweet apple' is the sweetness of love. However, being 'on the highest bough', it is inaccessible. Thus, to the unwary observer, 'the apple gatherers have forgotten it', suggesting that they are visibly trying to ignore it. However, the reader is told that 'they have not forgotten it completely, but they 'could not reach it', illustrating that it is an unreachable desire, perhaps even a need as apple gathering is the profession and means of financial support for apple gatherers. The appearance that the apple gatherers have forgotten the apples at the top of the tree illustrates the bitterness of desire, because they have to walk away still thinking and wanting for those apples. There is no mention of the lower apples that they did gather, suggesting that the apples they have are not the ones they want and are possibly less sweet. Just as Eros means lack, they have a lack of the sweetness they desire and are forced to pretend to ignore the desire as if they don't notice that it is there. 

Alcman 6:

Love once again, by the will of Kypris,

pours down in sweetness and melts my heart

.....

This gift of the sweet Muses

was shown forth by one blessed among maidens,

the fair-haired Megalostrata.

In Alcman 6, the reader sees an invocation of Kypris, or Aphrodite, making love 'pour down in sweetness and melt [the speaker's] heart' by her 'will'. The simultaneous duality of sweetness and image of a hot, melting heart (bitter bodily harm if taken literally) is exemplary of Carson's interpretation of physical representations of "sweetbitter" in Sappho that is only reinforced by the fact that the love is pushed upon the speaker by Aphrodite and born inorganically within them. The allusion of Megalostrata, a poet who charmed lovers (Alcman in particular) with conversation and poetry, 'one blessed among maidens' who possesses 'this gift of the sweet Muses', is an additional reference to Alcman's personal bittersweet love. Despite the break in the fragment, this reference to Megalostrata and the context that Alcman fell in love with her through her words, it is probable that the love willed by Aphrodite described in the first two lines is Alcman's expression of desire for Megalostrata. His love is sweet because of the enjoyment he has in conversing with Megalostrata but bitter because he is left wanting for her. 

The combination of these poems illustrates the bitter force of sweet desire that can appear to be ignored but will never be forgotten, and the physical impact of the singular instance of melting pain and hot pleasure at once. It is this force that makes desire a verb, as argued by Carson.