Meine Rosen

Meine Rosen (SA / 2024)

 

 

I. 

 

As is well known, Zarathustra often speaks cryptically.

 

Take the following sentence, for example, spoken when, walking through the forest with his disciples one evening, he came to a clearing where lovely maidens were dancing. Attempting to reassure the young women that he meant them no harm, he first praises their light-footedness before adding: 

 

'I am a forest and a night of dark trees: but she who is not afraid of my darkness will discover a bed of roses ...' [1]

What does that mean? 

 

It sounds like a rather elaborate chat-up line to me; i.e., a remark made both to initiate conversation and signal sexual interest. Of course, Zarathustra being Zarathustra, he can't help also displaying his intelligence and poetic sensibility (even as he openly admires the bare feet and fine ankles of the girls to whom he speaks).

 

 

II.

As Zarathustra is essentially Nietzsche's fictional mouthpiece, it's not surprising that the latter also liked to speak with pride about his roses ... 

 

Thus, in the poetic prelude to The Gay Science entitled 'Joke, Cunning, and Revenge' [2], Nietzsche includes a verse entitled Meine Rosen, which also combines the idea of rosy happiness or the promise of joy, with something a bit darker, a bit pervier, a bit more "malice-laden" as one translator has it [3].   

 

Below is my version of the poem; not exactly a translation, more a (somewhat prosified) reimagining, which, nevertheless, I think manages to make Nietzsche's point that those who want to find love and happiness - particularly as he understands these things - have to struggle and be prepared to take risks (i.e., engage in something that some might think of as edge play).

My Roses

 

Of course my happiness wishes to infect you - 

All joy is contagious! 

But if you'd like to smell my roses

 

You'll have to scramble first over rocky ledges

and cut through tangled thorny hedges,

pricking your tiny finger tips!

For my joy - it loves cruel teasing!

For my joy - it loves displeasing!    

Do you still want to pick my roses?

 

 

Notes 

 

[1] Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, II. 32.

[2] Nietzsche borrows this title from a libretto by Goethe: 'Scherz, List, und Rache'. Although the work was written in the 1780s (and published by the author in 1790), it was not set to music until 1881, when Nietzsche's young friend Peter Gast (Heinrich Köselitz) decided to undertake the task.

 

[3] I'm referring to Adrian Del Caro, whose translation of Nietzsche's poems in 'Joke, Cunning, and Revenge' can be found in the 2001 Cambridge edition of The Gay Science, ed. Bernard Williams, trans. Josefine Nauckhoff. 

      Del Caro attempts to stay as closely as he can to the rhyme scheme (and rhythm) of the German; readers can decide if succeeds (or not) in the case of Meine Rosen by turning to p. 13 of the above text. For an alternative translation, see Kaufmann's effort - conveniently placed alongside the German original - in The Gay Science (Vintage books, 1974), pp. 44-45.