The Scruple of Self-Praise
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" Que outrem possa louvar esforço alheio, Cousa é que se costuma e se deseja; Mas louvar os meus próprios, arreceio Que louvor tão suspeito mal me esteja; E para dizer tudo, temo e creio, Que qualquer longo tempo curto seja: Mas, pois o mandas, tudo se te deve, Irei contra o que devo, e serei breve.
That another should praise a stranger's valor is a thing both customary and welcome; but to praise my own people, I fear that praise so suspect would ill become me. And to tell it all, I fear and believe that any length of time would fall short. Yet, since you command it, everything is owed to you: I will go against what I ought, and be brief.
At the court of the King of Melinde, Vasco da Gama is asked to tell the history of his people. Before he begins, he voices his reluctance: to praise one's own nation invites suspicion.
Gama, asked to narrate the history of Portugal, opens not with the story but with a scruple. Praising the deeds of others, he says, is normal and even wished for; praising your own invites the suspicion that you are simply boasting. He raises a second worry too, that no stretch of time could hold the whole tale, then sets both aside: the king has commanded, so obedience overrides the poet's misgiving. The closing promise to be brief is the hinge that lets the narration begin.
The move is a modesty formula, but notice who is really caught in it. Gama the speaker and Camões the poet share one bind: how to praise the Portuguese without sounding like men praising themselves. The king's command dissolves the problem by shifting the responsibility onto the listener who asked, and "serei breve" is quietly ironic, since what follows runs for three full cantos. The scruple is not false, but it is also a technique for earning the reader's trust before the epic self-celebration starts.
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