Revised Standard Version places this verse within quotation marks, indicating that this is quoted speech; but Revised Standard Version does not identify the speaker. It is better, with Good News Translation and others, to say that the businessmen of verse 11 are the speakers.

The fruit for which thy soul longed has gone from thee: the Greek word translated fruit appears only here in the New Testament and means “autumn fruit,” that is, ripe fruit (a related word, “late autumn,” is used in Jude 12). Here the word means “all the good things,” “all the pleasures.” Unless fruit in a given language will be understood to indicate “good things,” the translator should abandon the figure and state clearly what is meant by the figure. For which thy soul longed is literally “the desire of thy soul.” The Greek noun meaning “desire” appears only here in this book. “the fruit, the desire of your soul” means “everything you longed for (or, craved).”

All thy dainties and thy splendor: in Greek there is a wordplay: ta lipara and ta lampra, which New English Bible represents quite well: “all the glitter and the glamour.” An American Translation and New American Bible, Revised have “luxury and splendor.” The first Greek word means “the fatty things,” that is, delicacies, luxuries, the good things of life; the second one means “the shining things” (see its use in the phrase “bright linen” in 15.6; 19.8). This probably refers to objects that glitter, such as gold, silver, and precious stones. One possible rendering is “all the things that make you look beautiful.”

Are lost to thee, never to be found again: the second part of this verse may be restructured as follows: “you have lost all your luxuries and riches, and you will never get them back again” or “you have lost all the things that make your life comfortable and all your expensive possessions, and you will never….” The verbal phrase are lost translates the active “have left (you)”; and (never) to be found translates the impersonal third plural active “they will (not) find,” meaning “(not) be found.” In at least one language this is expressed as follows: “you will not meet the day when you will find these things again.”

Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on The Revelation to John. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1993. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .