Barroco español·c. 1620·completo (soneto)
Francisco de Quevedo
Érase un hombre a una nariz pegado,
érase una nariz superlativa,
érase una nariz sayón y escriba,
érase un peje espada muy barbado.
Era un reloj de sol mal encarado,
érase un alquitara pensativa,
érase un elefante boca arriba,
era Ovidio Nasón más narizado.
Érase el espolón de una galera,
érase una pirámide de Egipto,
las doce tribus de narices era.
Érase un naricísimo infinito,
muchísimo nariz, nariz tan fiera
que en la cara de Anás fuera delito.
Context
Francisco de Quevedo (1580-1645) was the sharpest tongue of the Spanish Baroque. This sonnet — likely aimed at Luis de Góngora, his lifelong rival and possibly the target of antisemitic insinuation in the closing line — is the canonical Spanish example of how to spend an entire poem on a single insult. Every line is a different way of saying 'his nose was big'. The escalating absurdity is the joke and the craft.
In plain English prose
Once there was a man stuck to a nose, once there was a superlative nose, once there was a half-alive sundial, once there was a thoughtful swordfish, once there was an upside-down elephant, a scribe with a tougher beard than usual, a poorly-shaved Ovid Naso. Once was the spur of a galley, once was an Egyptian pyramid, the twelve tribes of noses was it. Once was a most infinite nasal-thing, much nose, nose-of-noses, a nose so fierce that, on Annas's face, it would have been a crime.
Read it out loud at least once.
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