Fecha de nacimiento: 29. Abril 1863
Fecha de muerte: 29. Abril 1933
Constantino Cavafis fue un poeta griego, una de las figuras literarias más importantes del siglo XX y uno de los mayores exponentes del renacimiento de la lengua griega moderna.
Trabajó como periodista y como funcionario, y publicó relativamente poco en vida, aunque tras su muerte su obra cobró paulatinamente influencia.
Versos de Poesías completas
Fuente: [[Señor], Luis, Diccionario de citas, Editorial Espasa Calpe, 2005, 75] ISBN 8423992543
Fuente: Inicio del poema LXIX Contemplé tanto (1917).
Fuente: [Kavafis] (1976), p.87
" In the Same Space http://cavafis.compupress.gr/kave_134.htm" (1929)
Contexto: p>I created you while I was happy, while I was sad,
with so many incidents, so many details.And, for me, the whole of you has been transformed into feeling.</p
The First Step http://www.cavafy.com/poems/content.asp?id=145&cat=1
Collected Poems (1992)
Contexto: Just to be on the first step
should make you happy and proud.
To have come this far is no small achievement:
what you have done is a glorious thing.
Even this first step
is a long way above the ordinary world.
To stand on this step
you must be in your own right
a member of the city of ideas.
And it is a hard, unusual thing
to be enrolled as a citizen of that city.
Its councils are full of Legislators
no charlatan can fool.
"Candles" [Κεριά], as translated by Manolis, in Constantine P. Cavafy: Poems (2008) edited by George Amabile
Contexto: I look before me at my lighted candles,
I don’t want to turn around and see with horror
How quickly the dark line is lengthening,
How quickly the candles multiply that have been put out.
Julian Seeing Contempt http://www.cavafy.com/poems/content.asp?id=108&cat=1
Collected Poems (1992)
Contexto: His friends weren’t Christians; that much was certain.
But even so they couldn’t play
as he could (brought up a Christian)
with a new religious system,
ludicrous in both theory and application.
They were, after all, Greeks. Nothing in excess, Augustus.
— Constantine P. Cavafy, Waiting for the Barbarians
Fuente: Waiting for the Barbarians (1904), l. 1
Contexto: What are we waiting for, assembled in the forum?The barbarians are due here today.
"After the Swim" as translated by Daniel Mendelsohn
Contexto: He wasn’t completely wrong, poor old Gemistus
(let Lord Andronicus and the patriarch suspect him if they like),
in wanting us, telling us to become pagan once again.
" In The Year 200 B.C. http://cavafis.compupress.gr/kave_1.htm" (1931)
Contexto: The Spartans weren't to be led
and ordered around
like precious servants. Besides,
they wouldn't have thought a pan-Hellenic expedition
without a Spartan king in command
was to be taken very seriously.
Of course, then, "except the Lacedaimonians." That's certainly one point of view. Quite understandable.
Collected Poems (1992), When the Watchman Saw the Light (1900)
Contexto: Now the longed-for signal has appeared. Yet when happiness comes
it brings less joy than one expected.
But at least we've gained this much: we've rid ourselves
of hope and expectation.
" In The Year 200 B.C. http://cavafis.compupress.gr/kave_1.htm" (1931)
Contexto: The Spartans weren't to be led
and ordered around
like precious servants. Besides,
they wouldn't have thought a pan-Hellenic expedition
without a Spartan king in command
was to be taken very seriously.
Of course, then, "except the Lacedaimonians." That's certainly one point of view. Quite understandable.
The Windows http://www.cavafy.com/poems/content.asp?id=137&cat=1
Collected Poems (1992)
Contexto: It will be a great relief when a window opens.
But the windows are not there to be found —
or at least I cannot find them. And perhaps
it is better that I don’t find them.
Perhaps the light will prove another tyranny.
Who knows what new things it will expose?
" The City http://cavafis.compupress.gr/kave_33.htm", st. 2 (1910)
Contexto: You won't find a new country, won't find another shore.
This city will always pursue you.
You'll walk the same streets, grow old
in the same neighbourhoods, turn grey in these same houses.
You'll always end up in this city. Don't hope for things elsewhere:
there's no ship for you, there's no road.
Now that you've wasted your life here, in this small corner,
you've destroyed it everywhere in the world.
An Old Man http://www.cavafy.com/poems/content.asp?id=39&cat=1
Collected Poems (1992)
Contexto: He knows he’s aged a lot: he sees it, feels it.
Yet it seems he was young just yesterday.
So brief an interval, so very brief. And he thinks of Prudence, how it fooled him,
how he always believed — what madness —
that cheat who said: “Tomorrow. You have plenty of time.”
Julian in Nicomedia http://www.cavafy.com/poems/content.asp?id=106&cat=1
Collected Poems (1992)
Contexto: Things impolitic and dangerous:
praise for Greek ideals,
supernatural magic, visits to pagan temples.
Enthusiasm for the ancient gods
But the Wise Perceive Things about to Happen http://www.cavafy.com/poems/content.asp?id=128&cat=1
Collected Poems (1992)
Contexto: Of what’s to come the wise perceive
things about to happen. Sometimes during moments of intense study
their hearing’s troubled: the hidden sound
of things approaching reaches them,
and they listen reverently, while in the street outside
the people hear nothing whatsoever.
Fuente: To Have Taken The Trouble (1930), l. 1
Contexto: I'm practically broke and homeless.
This fatal city, Antioch,
has devoured all my money:
this fatal city with its extravagant life.
One of Their Gods http://www.cavafy.com/poems/content.asp?id=40&cat=1
Collected Poems (1992)
Contexto: The people going by would gaze at him,
and one would ask the other if he knew him,
if he was a Greek from Syria, or a stranger.
But some who looked more carefully
would understand and step aside;
and as he disappeared under the arcades,
among the shadows and the evening lights,
going toward the quarter that lives
only at night, with orgies and debauchery,
with every kind of intoxication and desire,
they would wonder which of Them it could be,
and for what suspicious pleasure
he had come down into the streets of Selefkia
from the August Celestial Mansions.
" In the Same Space http://cavafis.compupress.gr/kave_134.htm" (1929)
Contexto: p>I created you while I was happy, while I was sad,
with so many incidents, so many details.And, for me, the whole of you has been transformed into feeling.</p
— Constantine P. Cavafy, Waiting for the Barbarians
Fuente: Waiting for the Barbarians (1904), l. 26
Contexto: Why this sudden bewilderment, this confusion?
(How serious people's faces have become.)
Why are the streets and squares emptying so rapidly,
everyone going home lost in thought?Because night has fallen and the barbarians haven't come.
And some of our men who have just returned from the border say
there are no barbarians any longer.Now what's going to happen to us without barbarians?
Those people were a kind of solution.
