How to say "See Naples and Die" in Latin?

Question

I am not a student of Latin; I merely wish to give my short story a Latin title, namely the Latin translation of "See Naples and Die." The best I could find, not understanding Latin grammar, is "Videre Neapolis ac Morior." If that's incorrect, can you please correct it for me? Thank you. (I chose "ac" because of the close relationship between Naples and death in my narrative.)

Answer 1

See Naples and die is a saying which became internationally known after J.W. Goethe mentioned it in his Italian Journey (vol. I, entry for March 2nd, 1787). Goethe quotes it in Italian (Vedi Napoli e poi muori!) and then translates it into German (Siehe Neapel und stirb!). The English version is a literal translation of the German one, but the problem is that the ambiguity of the original Italian was completely lost in the process. Furthermore, while in Italian and German the verbs refer undisputably to a singular subject, in English see and die could refer to plural subjects, which is a different ambiguity.

Few Italians would approve of the exclamation mark used by Goethe. True, vedi and muori might be imperatives, as Goethe understood them, but they might also be second-person indicatives, as in you see Naples and you die. Even if they are imperatives, they are not orders: the meaning is don’t die before seeing Naples; if they are indicatives, the meaning is either the sight of Naples makes you die of wonder or after seeing Naples you can happily die (because you will never see anything more beautiful). In fact, it is an ambiguous sentence and even native speakers of Italian like me are unsure. I tend to prefer the last interpretation, but I accept that the first two are completely legitimate. Everybody agrees that the general meaning is that the sight of Naples is a life-changing experience. (The racist interpretation if you visit Naples you will be killed by organized crime pops up sometimes in stand-up comedies, but is only a bad-taste joke.)

That said, let’s try a Latin translation. Italian uses e poi ( = and then ) to bind the two verbs; Goethe forgot to translate poi ( = then ) but it is important, because it places the second action explicitly after the first one. In Latin, a good way to express precedence in time is a costruction called ablativus absolutus, which doesn’t use a finite verb and gives us Neapolī conspectā for the first part. The verb to use can be chosen among many. My preference is for conspicio, which combines vision with emotional experience. For the second part, in my opinion a future tense could convey all three possible meanings of the Italian original. So my proposal is

Neapolī conspectā moriēris

It can be translated back as you will die after seeing Naples. At least, it sounds Latin and has a certain gravity.