Derek Mahon: VIII: Hangover Square

Allusion to Classical figure Siren, Sphinx, (the destructive muses of ‘Yeats’ ‘tragic’ generation’), Cynara.

Relationship to Classical text Mahon quotes part of a line from Horace’s Odes 4.i, ‘sub regno Cynarae’ (i.e. Non sum qualis eram bonae sub regno Cynarae).

Close translation of words/phrases/excerpts

Classical/post-Classical intertexts The Horation quote, Non sum quails eram... (see above), is the title of a poem by Ernest Dowson. Dowson’s name occurs earlier in the poem, with those of contemporaries, Lionel Johnson, Arthur Symons and Richard Le Gallienne, all contributors to the literary journal The Yellow Book (named after the corrupting novel in Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray), from which Mahon’s collection takes its name. Mahon recalls the wine and roses which figure in Dowson’s poem.