道化

解説

付記

ポルトガルの未亡人である女王は、大胆な道化師を抱えていた。 彼は懺悔室に忍び込み、変装して女王の告解を聞いた。 「神父様、耳を傾けてください。 私の罪は真紅よりも深いのです。 私は道化を愛しています、 あの冒涜的な道化、 卑しい生まれの身分の低い男を」 偽りの司祭は答えた。「娘よ、 その罪は確かに恐ろしい。 教会は許しを与えない、不法な愛には。」 「しかし、あなたの頑なな心は、 彼のために永遠に嘆願するでしょうから、 あなたは彼を、布告によって、 生まれも育ちも良い男にした方がよいでしょう」 女王は道化を公爵にした、 天国のタブーとごまかすことを願って。 それから一人の司祭に話し、 司祭は教皇に話し、 教皇は祭壇から彼女を呪った！ ―― バレル・ドルト

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Original

An officer formerly attached to a king's household, whose business it was to amuse the court by ludicrous actions and utterances, the absurdity being attested by his motley costume. The king himself being attired with dignity, it took the world some centuries to discover that his own conduct and decrees were sufficiently ridiculous for the amusement not only of his court but of all mankind. The jester was commonly called a fool, but the poets and romancers have ever delighted to represent him as a singularly wise and witty person. In the circus of to-day the melancholy ghost of the court fool effects the dejection of humbler audiences with the same jests wherewith in life he gloomed the marble hall, panged the patrician sense of humor and tapped the tank of royal tears.

Additional notes

The widow-queen of Portugal Had an audacious jester Who entered the confessional Disguised, and there confessed her. Father, she said, "thine ear bend down— My sins are more than scarlet: I love my fool—blaspheming clown, And common, base-born varlet." Daughter, the mimic priest replied, That sin, indeed, is awful: The church's pardon is denied To love that is unlawful. But since thy stubborn heart will be For him forever pleading, Thou'dst better make him, by decree, A man of birth and breeding." She made the fool a duke, in hope With Heaven's taboo to palter; Then told a priest, who told the Pope, Who damned her from the altar! Barel Dort