As I was nearing completion of the music side of a Latin language cover version of George Harrison's "Here Comes the Sun," the idea struck me that the video version needed to be a way for Latin teachers to greet and encourage their Latin students as we all struggle through this unprecedented experience of Distance Learning.
With the help of Meghan Kiernan, who is a better connected Latinist than myself, I received enough video clips to forge what I think is a nice tribute to this moment in time.
Following the names of contributors, I include an explanation of my translation choices that went into the Latin lyrics for the song.
I thank all who participated in this project:
Magistra Jessica
Anderson, Mineola High School
Magistra Jenn Armstrong:
Shenendehowa High School, Clifton Park, NY
Magistra Keziah
Armstrong, Shenendehowa High School, Clifton Park, NY
Magistra Gemma Ball,
Bolton School Girls’ Division
Dr. Jason Blackburn, Lexington
HIgh School, Lexington School District One, SC
Magister John Bracey,
Belmont High School, Belmont Public Schools
Magistra Stephanie Buckler,
Stafford HS, Dixon-Smith MS, and Drew MS, VA
Magistra Cassie Caplan , Bronxville School
Magistra Kathleen Durkin, Garden
City High School, NY
Dr. Brenda Fields , Windermere Preparatory School
Trish Gibson, Oxley
College
Magistra Laura Holland,
Garrison Forest School, MD
Magistra Jennifer
Jarnagin , The Episcopal School of Dallas.
Mr Andy Keen, Bristol
Grammar School, Bristol, UK
Ms Meghan Kiernan, Freehold
Township High School
Magistra Maureen Lamb, Kingswood
Oxford School
Michael Maguire, Boston
Latin Academy
Dr. Keith Andrew Massey,
Leonia High School, Leonia, NJ
Dr. Jason Nabors, Central
Magnet School, Murfreesboro, TN
Magistra Cathy Pinkley , Franklin County High School Rocky Mount VA
Magister Ben Revkin from
East Greenwich High School in East Greenwich, RI
Ms Claire Rostron, Winchester
College, Winchester UK
Magistra Francesca Sapsford,
Strathallan School, Scotland.
Dr. Abigail Simone, Houston
High School,
Allyson Spencer-Bunch, JFK
Middle School, Northampton Public Schools.
Magistra Melanie Streed , St. Stephen's & St. Agnes School,
Alexandria, VA
Explanation of Translation Choices for “Here Comes the Sun”
Keith Andrew Massey, PhD
“Here Comes the Sun”
The first and arguably most important decision involves the often repeated titular phrase, “Here Comes the Sun.”
One is immediately forced to make a decision on what exactly is the grammar underlying George Harrison’s statement. One option is to see the word “Here” as meaning, “It is coming here.” If this is the case, we want the Latin word that means “hither,” “to here,” i.e, huc.
My instinct, however, is that the word “Here” means something more along the lines of, “Look! The Sun is coming!” And so I have rendered it with the word “ecce.”
I take as corroboration St. Jerome’s translation of Genesis 37:17, widely translated into English as “Here comes that dreamer!” (vid. RSV, NIV, et al.):
“Ecce somniator venit.”
“Little Darling”
To render this frequently repeated form of address I have gone with the well attested term of endearment “Deliciae,” which fortuitously has the same number of syllables as the original English, thus making it perfectly singable.
“It Feels Like Years Since it’s Been Here.”
The question we must first address is, what is the referent of the word “IT”? Is George talking about the aforementioned Winter? In other words, Oh, it’s still winter, it feels like years since it’s been here! Or is he talking about the Sun, which has theoretically NOT been here for a long time and now is finally here?
For me, the deciding factor comes from the parallel phrase in another verse:
“It seems like years since it’s been clear.”
In this case, it has NOT been clear, but finally, with the arrival of the Sun, it is now clear.
The fact that he also completely repeats the phrase in the next verse, following the mention of the “Smile” makes it further unlikely that he is switching up what the “IT” is referring to.
Why does this matter? It matters because I will be rendering both of these sentences as Indirect Statement Constructions. And the choice of the accusative pronoun requires me to know the referent, and therefore its gender to choose the correct one! If he is talking about the Winter (hiems) I need the feminine “eam.” I am deciding that the “IT” here is the Sun, and so I use the masculine “eum.”
And so, I render the phrase “It feels like years since it’s been here” as an Indirect Statement with a literal English translation:
“It feels (that) for years it (the sun) not to have been here.”
Sentit annos eum non fuisse hic
The precise word order is chosen primarily to make it sing more fluidly.
“The Smile[’]s Returning to the Faces”
What makes this one a bit tricky is that what George seems to actually sing in the recording is different from his original handwritten lyrics, which read:
“The smiles are returning to their faces.”
I put the apostrophe in brackets above because potentially George actually sang what his handwritten lyrics first attested, but the key words “are” and :”their” just didn’t come out clearly in the recording.
I have decided to just translate based on what it sounds like and make the word which sounds like “Smiles” into “Smile’s” (contraction of “Smile is”).
“I Feel that Ice is Slowly Melting”
If you look up “to melt” in a typical Latin dictionary, you will find “liquefacere” in the transitive and the intransitive “liquescere.” I am again going to St. Jerome for a different option, such as in Psalm 67:3:
“Sicut fluit cera a facie ignis”
“As wax melts before fire.”
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