"Waiting for the Barbarians" (Περιμένοντας τοὺς Bαρβάρους) is a

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

poem by

Constantine P. Cavafy Konstantinos Petrou Kavafis ( el, Κωνσταντίνος Πέτρου Καβάφης ; April 29 (April 17, OS), 1863 – April 29, 1933), known, especially in English, as Constantine P. Cavafy and often published as C. P. Cavafy (), was a Gree ...

. It was written in November 1898 and printed around December 1904, as a private pamphlet. This poem falls under the umbrella of historical poems Cavafy created in his anthology.

Story

This poem describes a city-state in decline, whose population and

legislator A legislator (also known as a deputy or lawmaker) is a person who writes and passes laws, especially someone who is a member of a legislature. Legislators are often elected by the people of the state. Legislatures may be supra-national (for ex ...

s are waiting for the arrival of the “''Barbarians''”. When night falls, the barbarians have not arrived. The poem ends: “What is to become of us without Barbarians? Those people were a solution of a sort.” The poem influenced literary works such as ''

The Tartar Steppe ''The Tartar Steppe'' ( it, Il deserto dei Tartari, ), also published as ''The Stronghold'' (''La fortezza''), is a novel by Italian author Dino Buzzati, published in 1940. The novel tells the story of a young officer, Giovanni Drogo, and his li ...

'' by

Dino Buzzati Dino Buzzati-Traverso (; 14 October 1906 – 28 January 1972) was an Italian novelist, short story writer, painter and poet, as well as a journalist for '' Corriere della Sera''. His worldwide fame is mostly due to his novel ''The Tartar St ...

(1940), ''

The Opposing Shore ''The Opposing Shore'' (french: Le Rivage des Syrtes) is a 1951 novel by the French writer Julien Gracq. The story is set at the border between two fictional Mediterranean countries, Orsenna and Farghestan, which have been at war for 300 years. It ...

'' (1951) by

Julien Gracq Julien Gracq (; 27 July 1910 – 22 December 2007; born Louis Poirier in Saint-Florent-le-Vieil, in the French ''département'' of Maine-et-Loire) was a French writer. He wrote novels, critiques, a play, and poetry. His literary works were note ...

, and ''

Waiting for the Barbarians ''Waiting for the Barbarians'' is a novel by the South African writer J. M. Coetzee. First published in 1980, it was chosen by Penguin for its series '' Great Books of the 20th Century'' and won both the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and Geo ...

'' (1980) by

J. M. Coetzee John Maxwell Coetzee OMG (born 9 February 1940) is a South African–Australian novelist, essayist, linguist, translator and recipient of the 2003 Nobel Prize in Literature. He is one of the most critically acclaimed and decorated authors in ...

. The questions stated in the poem are all in fifteen-syllable lines, whilst the answers mostly occur in twelve-syllable - sometimes thirteen-syllable - lines. The conclusion is in thirteen-syllable lines. According to the poet himself, Cavafy said that the barbarians are a symbol in this work; “the emperor, the senators and the orators are not necessarily

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

.”

Excerpt

Techniques

Irony

A big focus for many of Cavafy's political poems consist of

irony Irony (), in its broadest sense, is the juxtaposition of what on the surface appears to be the case and what is actually the case or to be expected; it is an important rhetorical device and literary technique. Irony can be categorized into ...

, or at times

dramatic irony Irony (), in its broadest sense, is the juxtaposition of what on the surface appears to be the case and what is actually the case or to be expected; it is an important rhetorical device and literary technique. Irony can be categorized into ...

. The first speaker appears to act in a naïve manner, and the second, in comparison, seems sophisticated. In reality, as the conclusions implies, no citizen in the city is acting with solid or with enough information. Instead, these citizens are all behaving in accordance to their expectations of what they believe the barbarians will look as well as behave like. At the same time, the poet is showcasing how sometimes politicians can appear clueless or distant from their country's problem and sugar-coat their misfortunes with their opulence. Neither the senate nor the emperor provide any positive action. In their passive roles they are like the people they lead, they're waiting for the intervention of an external force.

Imagery

The imagery of the poem presents a complex

civilization A civilization (or civilisation) is any complex society characterized by the development of a state, social stratification, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyond natural spoken language (namely, a writing system). Ci ...

, wealthy and prosperous, that has peaked to the point of its inevitable downfall. Nowhere does the poet explicitly state his opinion. On the contrary, he prefers understatement and irony, allowing adjectives such as “''embroidered'',” “''magnificent'',” and “''elegant'',” used to describe

toga The toga (, ), a distinctive garment of ancient Rome, was a roughly semicircular cloth, between in length, draped over the shoulders and around the body. It was usually woven from white wool, and was worn over a tunic. In Roman historical tra ...

s and

jewelry Jewellery ( UK) or jewelry (U.S.) consists of decorative items worn for personal adornment, such as brooches, rings, necklaces, earrings, pendants, bracelets, and cufflinks. Jewellery may be attached to the body or the clothes. From a western ...

. This conveys the grandiose, yet static quality of this civilization, which at this point in its development can do no more than display itself.

History

The poem was written in November 1898 and first published in 1904.Some Sort of a Solution: Charles Simic reviews 'The Collected Poems' by C.P. Cavafy, translated by Evangelos Sachperoglou and 'The Canon' by C.P. Cavafy, translated by Stratis Haviaras
by Charles Simić; in the ''

London Review of Books The ''London Review of Books'' (''LRB'') is a British literary magazine published twice monthly that features articles and essays on fiction and non-fiction subjects, which are usually structured as book reviews. History The ''London Review of ...

'' (vol. 30, no. 6; page 32-34); published March 20, 2008 ; retrieved March 7, 2015 It has since been translated into several languages and has inspired numerous other works.

Daniel Mendelsohn Daniel Mendelsohn (born 1960), is an American author, essayist, critic, columnist, and translator. Best known for his internationally best-selling and award-winning Holocaust family memoir The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million, he is curre ...

(one of many translators who has produced an English version of "Waiting")Andrew Ford: Waiting for the Barbarians
by Andrew Ford, at AndrewFord.net.au; published no later than March 6, 2012; retrieved March 7, 2015 has said that the poem's portrayal of a state whose lawmakers sit in stagnant idleness was "particularly prescient" in light of the

United States federal government shutdown of 2013 From October 1 to October 17, 2013, the United States federal government entered a shutdown and curtailed most routine operations because neither legislation appropriating funds for fiscal year 2014 nor a continuing resolution for the interim ...

.“Waiting for the Barbarians” and the Government Shutdown
by

, in ''

the New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

''; published October 1, 2013; retrieved March 7, 2015

Robert Pinsky Robert Pinsky (born October 20, 1940) is an American poet, essayist, literary critic, and translator. From 1997 to 2000, he served as Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress. Pinsky is the author of nineteen books, most of ...

has described it as "cunning" and "amusing".Waiting for the Barbarians (by Constantine Cavafy)
by Robert Pinsky; in ''

Slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...

''; published June 26, 1997; retrieved March 7, 2015 Charles Simić has called it "an apt description of any state that needs enemies, real or imaginary, as a perpetual excuse", while ''

the Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

'' considered the poem's final line evocative of "the dangers implied by the end of the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...

".Wednesday's book: Waiting for the Barbarians by Lewis Lapham (Verso, pounds 17)
by Godfrey Hodgson ; in ''

''; published January 14, 1998; retrieved March 7, 2015

Homages

's 1980 novel ''

'' is named for the poem,Konstantinos Kavaphes (Constantine Cavafy) · Waiting for the Barbarians (Translated by Richmond Lattimore)
at ''

the Kenyon Review ''The Kenyon Review'' is a literary magazine based in Gambier, Ohio, US, home of Kenyon College. ''The Review'' was founded in 1939 by John Crowe Ransom, critic and professor of English at Kenyon College, who served as its editor until 1959. ' ...

''; first published no later than March 6, 2012 (date of earliest version on

archive.org The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...

); retrieved March 7, 2015Doubling the Point: Essays and Interviews
by David Attwell; published 1992 by

Harvard University Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is a publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University, and focused on academic publishing. It is a member of the Association of American University Presses. After the retirem ...

(via

Google Books Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google Inc. that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical c ...

) as are ''Waiting for the Barbarians'', the 1998 essay collection by Lewis H. Lapham and ''Waiting for the Barbarians'', the 2013 essay collection by Daniel Mendelsohn.Waiting for the Barbarians by Daniel Mendelsohn – review
by Christopher Bray, in ''

the Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

''; published January 6, 2013; retrieved March 7, 2015 American composer

Philip Glass Philip Glass (born January 31, 1937) is an American composer and pianist. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential composers of the late 20th century. Glass's work has been associated with minimal music, minimalism, being built up fr ...

has also written an opera of the same name based on the Coetzee novel which premiered in September 2005 at

Theater Erfurt The Theater Erfurt is a German municipal theatre located in Erfurt, the capital of Thuringia. The main stage is in a building in the Brühlervorstadt, completed in 2003. The theatre offers musical theatre and concerts, played by the Philharmonisc ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. Peter Carey's 1981 novel ''

Bliss BLISS is a system programming language developed at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) by W. A. Wulf, D. B. Russell, and A. N. Habermann around 1970. It was perhaps the best known system language until C debuted a few years later. Since then, C b ...

'' sees Lucy's young Communist boyfriend Kenneth quoting the first stanza directly from John Mavrogordato's translation.

Anaal Nathrakh Anaal Nathrakh are a British extreme metal band formed in 1999 in Birmingham by multi-instrumentalist Mick Kenney and vocalist Dave Hunt. They are currently signed to Metal Blade Records. The band's name is Irish for ''snake's breath'' ( anál ...

's 2006 album '' Eschaton'' has a song named after the poem. ''Await Barbarians'', the 2014 album by

Alexis Taylor Alexis Taylor (born 20 April 1980) is an English singer, songwriter, and musician. He is best known as the lead vocalist, keyboardist, and guitarist of the band Hot Chip. He is also the keyboardist of the band About Group and has released solo ...

, is also named for the poem;Don't Write for the Barbarians
by Joe Fassler, in ''

The Atlantic ''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science. It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...

''; published July 25, 2014; retrieved March 7, 2015 similarly, that album's song "Without a Crutch" alludes directly to it. In 2011, Andrew Ford adapted the poem into a choral work.Waiting for the Barbarians : SATB choir by Andrew Ford
at the

Australian Music Centre The Australian Music Centre (AMC), formerly known briefly as Sounds Australian, is a national organisation promoting and supporting art music in Australia, founded in 1974. It co-hosts the Art Music Awards along with APRA AMCOS, and publishes '' ...

; published no later than June 5, 2012; retrieved March 7, 2015 In 2012,

Constantine Koukias Constantine Koukias (born 14 October 1965) is a Tasmanian composer and opera director of Greek ancestry based in Amsterdam, where he is known by his Greek name of Konstantin Koukias. He is the co-founder and artistic director of IHOS Music Theatre ...

adapted it into an opera, "The Barbarians".Greek poet becomes a Greek opera
by Stephen Smooker, at NeosKosmos.com; published January 13, 2012; retrieved March 7, 2015

References

{{reflist

External links

''Waiting for the Barbarians''
in the original Greek, at the Cavafy Archive
''Waiting for the Barbarians''
translated into English by

Edmund Keeley Edmund Leroy "Mike" Keeley (February 5, 1928 – February 23, 2022) was an American novelist, translator, and essayist, a poet, and Charles Barnwell Straut Professor of English at Princeton University. He was a noted expert on the Greek poets C. ...

and

Philip Sherrard Philip Owen Arnould Sherrard (23 September 1922 – 30 May 1995) was a British author and translator. His work includes translations of Modern Greek poets, and books on Modern Greek literature and culture, metaphysics, theology, art and aesthet ...

''Waiting for the Barbarians''
translated into English by John Cavafy
''Waiting for the Barbarians''
translated into English by Stratis Haviaras 1904 poems Poems by Constantine P. Cavafy