At Bonneval in France, Barnabe Googe

edited by Beth Sullivan

Barnabe Googe was born in 1540 and lived until 1594. In 1555 he entered Cambridge, and two years later became a ward of the court when his father died. He was a kinsman to the influential Sir William Cecil, the Queen's secretary, and therefore had an "in" among the more famous literary members of the Court. "At Bonneval in France" appeared in print for the first time in Googe's Eclogues, Epitaphs, and Sonnets(1563).
Googe's work has been edited by Judith M. Kennedy in Googe: Eclogues, Epitaphs, and Sonnets(University of Toronto Press, 1989). According to Kennedy, the poem relates to a section of Ovid's Remedia Amoris, which discusses a man fleeing or leaving the woman he loves, as to not grieve over her. Googe seems to be doing just this in Bonneval, but unfortunately runs into more trouble. With the reference to Scylla and Charybdis Googe sets the stage of the poem as being caught between a rock and a hard place.
"Bonneval" in the poem's title alludes to a town southwest of Paris, near Chartres, on the central overland route from England to Spain. Other poems by Googe, such as "Going towards Spain" and 'Coming homeward out of Spain", may help explain the title.
Kennedy's edition appears to be the most recent and reliable scholarly text and includes some interesting notes on the specific meter of the poem.

		O fond Affection,
		wounder of my heart,
		When wilt thou cease
		to breed my restless pain?
		When comes the end                             5 
		of this my cruel smart?
		When shall my force
		beat back thy force again?
		When shall I say
		this restless rage of mine,                    10
		By reason ruled,
		is banished quite away,
		And I escaped
		these cruel bonds of thine,
		O flaming fiend,                               15
		that seekest my decay?
		Safe thinking I,
		Charybdis' rage to fly
		On Scylla rock
		in Bonneval I die.                             20

1. fond] foolish, with a hint of the naive or gullible. Affection] desire, especially sexual attraction.
4. breed] engender, give rise to. my] the 1563 edition appears to read "my" with a mark over the "m". Kennedy's edition reads "thy."
6. smart] sharp physical pain.
7. force] strength, vigor.
10. restless] continual, without rest.
15. flaming] fiery hot (as from hell). fiend] devil, demon.
18. Charybdis] a dangerous whirlpool on the coast of Sicily opposite the Italian rock Scylla. fly] flee from.
19. Scylla] a rock on the Italian side of the Straits of Messina facing Charybdis; also personified as a dangerous sea monster who, along with Charybdis, threatened Odysseus and his fellow mariners in Homer's Odyssey.

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