Poetry
Hercules
Not translated into English
Georg Stiernhielm · 1658
Synopsis
One morning, on the threshold of his youth, Hercules gets up full of anguish, not knowing how to begin his life or by which road to win honour. First there appears Fru Lusta, Lady Pleasure, with her daughters Sloth, Lust and Vanity and her son Drunkenness: life is short, death comes quickly, let him enjoy himself, dance and drink instead of training in arms, for glory is only wind. Fru Dygd, Lady Virtue, then sets against this labour, knowledge and true honour, which comes from God.
Context
Completed in 1643 according to the Swedish National Encyclopedia, the poem was printed in 1658, then placed at the head of the 1668 collection Musae Suethizantes, whose Latin title announces that the Muses now speak Swedish. The fable comes from the sophist Prodicus, via Xenophon; the two ladies and the retinue of Pleasure bear Swedish names there, and most of the text consists of their two speeches. The metre adapts ancient metrics to Swedish, substituting stress for quantity. The poem is addressed to the young nobles whom the new wealth of the aristocracy exposed to a dissolute life.
Who it is for
A long allegorical poem in hexameters, in seventeenth-century Swedish; there is an annotated French translation.
Prizes and reception
The most famous poem of its author, the first Swedish poem in hexameters, which earns him the name of father of Swedish poetry.
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