A year ago I put up a post that included a few lines I thought might make a good epigraph for “Autobiography of a Book.”
This poem by the Greek poet Strato of Sardis has good possibilities as an epigraph too:
Lucky little scroll, I am not jealous. Some boy
while reading you might squeeze you, touch his chin with you,
or press you to his dainty lips, or even place you on
his tender thighs to roll you up, most blessedest of scrolls.
You will often rest there on his bosom, and when he puts
you on his chair, fearless you will dare caress his bottom.
You will hold conversations all alone with him.
I beg you, little scroll, put in a word for me quite often.
Scrolls were the book equivalent of the time. Strato was writing in the second century A. D. The translation is by James J. Wilhelm.
source: Gay and Lesbian Poetry: an anthology from Sappho to Michelangelo
edited by James J. Wilhelm
1995. Garland Publishing, New York
1995. Garland Publishing, New York
