COMPARISON BETWEEN "MY GALLEY CHARGED WITH FORGETFULNESS" AND  "PASSA LA NAVE MIA COLPA DI OBLIO"

"My galley charged with forgetfulness" is a sonnet because it consists of 14 lines. It belongs to a collection, indeed the title resumes the beginning of the poem. The writer is Thomas Wyatt but the true author is Petrarch, one of the best known Italian sonneteers. Thomas Wyatt in fact, brought the Italian sonnets into England and he limited to translate them into the English language . "My galley charged with forgetfulness" is his translation of "Passa la nave mia colpa di oblio", Petrarch's Rime 189.

The structure of the two sonnets is mainly the same: both are arranged into an octave and a sestet. The theme is that of forgetfulness, metaphor of all life's difficulties.

Also the context is the same, the narrator is talking about a voyage that he is taking. It is night and he is travelling in a difficult situation: it is dark, the landscape is only formed by rocks and rocks the captain is his enemy and they are facing a stormy sea. In addition, the stars which would enable the pilot to navigate are obscured and his hope to reach the harbor disappears.

The voyage is a metaphor of Petrarch and Wyatt's life that represents the hardship. The problem set out in the octave is that of love (personified with the figure of the captain). The love makes them live difficult situations: their feelings are figured by the stormy sea (confusion) and  darkness (lack of happiness). Therefore the problem is the impossibility to stop their passion. In the sestet the solution is given: the only way to find a solution is the sight of their beloved but they understand that it is impossible (indeed the narrators tell that they can't see the stars).

Thomas Wyatt's sonnet has got some differences from the Italian one, especially what concerns the feelings communicated. Both reflect about life, but in the first the view point sounds more negative.

ANALYSIS OF THE LINES

Line 1: "Nave" ≠ "galley". Wyatt doesn't use ship because during Wyatt's period the galleys were more used. "oblio" ≠ "forgetfulness" and "passa"≠ "charged": English choices are more concrete, indeed Anglo-Saxon literature was more pragmatic instead of Latin one.

Line 2: "Aspro" and "sharp" mark the hardship of the journey, "in winter nights" means that there is a repetitive sense of darkness.

Line 3: Petrarch makes reference to Scilla and Cariddi, instead Wyatt to "rocks and rocks" (repeated to emphasize the hardship to face the,)  because it is the current straits of Messina and so very distant from England.

Line 4: "that" is used to take distance, the lord is cruel. Wyatt shifts the attention in how things are done, therefore  he focused on the way and not in who he is.

Line 5: the line means that whenever the character uses the oar, he thinks about problematic situation and the solution of it. Wyatt's has got more ideas of difficulties in his mind.

Line 6: Petrarch uses a symbol: the storm that figures the difficulties and "e'l fin", that is the death. Therefore the writer uses a natural metaphor in order to speak about psychological troubles. Wyatt makes reference to "death were light", that is an oxymoron that makes the reader understand that he prefer to die. His description is more concrete than the first one.

Line 7: in the Petrarchan line, the word order is altered in order to make the reader reflect. The wind in the Wyatt's sonnet "tears the sail apace", so it is more violent because it manages to break the sail quickly.

Line 8: in the Petrarchan sonnet the wind sweeps away sighs, hopes and desires. Wyatt is more pessimistic because his winds also drags the fear to trust.

Line 9: the cloud in "My galley charged with forgetfulness" is formed by "dark disdain". It is a more negative vision.

Line 10: the Wyatt's words order is altered.

Line 11: Petrarchan words order is altered.

Line 12: Wyatt is more concrete, he makes reference to the stars that makes him feel pain, instead Petrarch to " I duo mei dolci usati segni" that  is a description less pragmatic. "This" emphasize his sorrow.

Line 13: in both of the sonnets the words order is altered to make the reader pay more attention.

Line 14: Wyatt proves himself once again more pessimistic because he totally loses the hope to reach the harbor and so a solution, instead Petrarch writes that he has just started to lose it.