Alfred De Musset (1810-1857)
Alfred De Musset
The woman in question was not dead. According to the translator, Stanley Appelbaum, ‘The ‘Morte’ of the poem, the Princess Belgiojoso, was not at all dead but coquettishly indifferent to the poet’s advances.’
This is taken from “Introduction to French Poetry’ edited by Stanley Appelbaum, who claims in his introduction that the translations are ‘definitely not intended to be poetic recreations of the original works, but merely aids to the understanding of the content’. In this case the English version seems to stand on its own..