Translating Strato: The importance of Translations in the study of Ancient Sexuality and Understanding Classical Erotica (1)

 

In the years after Dover and Foucault, research on ancient sexuality focussed on reconstructing the conventional norms—the rules of the game, so to speak—which differed from modern rules: in the case of pederasty, the assignment of active and passive roles to man and boy respectively, the age limits, and so on. But conventional rules are normative, not descriptive; and more recent studies, especially of Roman sexuality, have sought to fill out the picture with a more subtle appreciation of the broader realities of sexual life in the ancient world.(2)

Studies of Greek pederasty have emphasized the Archaic and Classical periods to the exclusion of the later literature which actually sup-plies most of our explicitly erotic material, such as Strato’s collection of pederastic epigrams, preserved as Book 12 of the Greek Anthology.(3) Because of this limited focus, Dover’s classic study dismissed Strato in a footnote (4); and his attitude seems to have prevailed over Buffière’s sensitive appreciation of this poet as a keen observer of the “detours” of sexual mores.(5)

Strato will be an important source for expanding and deepening our understanding of the extent to which the Greeks could appreciate the ironies and limitations of their own sexuality. At the end of his anthology (AP 12.258), he offers a revealing disclaimer: Don’t think all the sentiments expressed are my own, he says; “I tailor what I write to different boy-lovers in each case.” The poems bear this out. For example, the persona of 12.227 asserts that when one looks at a boy on the street, one should look at his face, but it is gauche to turn around for the rear view after passing. But the speaker in 12.223, who is too shy to look the boy in the eye, does exactly that. Again, some poems, like 12.248, suggest a desire to stretch the conventional pederastic age limits, while others, like 12.204, reassert them.

Some of these poems toy with aspects of the pederastic paradigm which perhaps seemed as arbitrary to late ancient pederasts as they do to modern researchers. For example, what about the assumption, found repeatedly in Strato, that boys dread the appearance of body hair, as if they do not want to mature and switch roles? How does this relate to the view that boys did not enjoy being passive, but did it as a favour? Is it just patronising sarcasm, or does it suggest that “pathic” desire was more common than society liked to admit? There is much worth studying in Strato. The poems with diverging points of view may have been inspired by the rhetorical technique of the Second Sophistic; but to be effective as erotic epigrams, they must have reflected social realities as well. So they might be relevant, e.g., to claims that there was something like a homosexual subculture. When Strato finally receives as much attention as Martial has received, students of ancient sexuality will scrutinize his poems—and their translations—in connection with such issues.

The recent appearance of Daryl Hine’s fresh and imaginative translation (6) may stimulate interest in Strato’s anthology. Hine himself is a poet. But precisely those qualities which make enjoyment of the poems more accessible for the general reader may cause difficulty when his book is consulted by people studying ancient sexuality. Whereas earlier translations used to distort erotic content for reasons of censorship, Hine makes brilliant adaptations to create amusing epigrams with erotic twists and sociocultural allusions to which a modern reader can relate. But sexual historians need an accurate conveyance of the original content.

There is a problem here, to which a concept current among professional translators may be pertinent. Professionals are expected to tailor their methods for their clients. Commercial and government offices, for example, often require that the translated version of a document read as if it were originally written in that language. The reader is not to be reminded that this is a translation, even if content must be altered. A simple, real example is chocolate bars labelled “made in Canada” and “fait au Québec.” The message is that the customer is supporting her domestic economy; but even federalist Quebecers tend to regard the province as their economic homeland. This is sometimes called “cultural translation,” and it is very relevant to erotic literature. But it would not suit lawyers, for example. They may even wish to cross-examine the translator to know exactly what was changed and why.

In the case of classical erotic epigrams, there is a similar tension between the needs of readers and researchers. But today the translator’s readership comprises a complicated spectrum between these two groups. Research on ancient sexuality has been published by philosophers and art historians, by professors of English and comparative literature, as well as by classicists. Even classicists consult translations for teaching purposes. On the other hand, many general readers are more aware of linguistic pluralism and the difficulties of translation than used to be the case.

Moreover, sexuality and humour are very time-bound and culture-bound phenomena. Even within the corpus of North American erotic poetry, there is a separate tradition of less known poets like Dennis Kelly, Harold Norse in his love poems, or Perry Brass, addressing gay readers, while other gay poets, like Tom Gunn, are better known because they composed for a general readership. If this lesser cultural barrier has obstructed effective communication between poets and readers representing different segments of our own society, how much wider a gap must be bridged to express Strato’s desires and wit!

Already before Dover’s study, a very competent uncensored translation of Strato had been published by the renowned French novelist Roger Peyrefitte. (7) It is revealing to compare this with Hine’s translation, because Peyrefitte’s approach is more conservative, so that one might initially expect it to be a more reliable historical source. My objectives in the present paper are, first, by comparing Hine’s translation with Peyrefitte’s, to reveal how much information of potential interest to researchers was sacrificed to craft effective poems; and second, to stimulate thought about translation methods which might alleviate this problem. Although critical observations are implicit in my discussion, I do not attempt to provide a balanced review of Hine’s work, much less a comparative review of both translations. I take Hine’s version of Strato to represent an imaginative, relatively free translation which is widely read, and I examine it only in order to illustrate the difficulties which arise when either type of translation is used as source material for the study of ancient sexuality

Sometimes the cultural gap is so wide that the poems are hardly translatable. AP 12.225 is a series of obscure astronomical and mythological puns. I shall not discuss them in detail, but some explanations may be found in Paton’s (8) and Peyrefitte’s notes.

Paton’s translation (in the Loeb series) is relatively literal, so that we may quote it for reference:

When the sunlight is rising at dawn, never should you join the blazing

Dog with the Bull lest one day, when Demeter, Mother of Grain, has

been given a soaking, you wet Heracles’ hairy wife.

Hine writes:

At cock crow there is never any need

To do it doggy style or milk the bull,

Or to besprinkle with your liquid seed

Your Ganymede’s pubescent patch of wool.

No astronomy and little mythology need be invoked to understand this. The meaning of these images is clear enough; but what is the point? Why not at dawn? In spite of Hine’s radical alteration of the content, the meaning of the poem remains obscure.

Peyrefitte offers footnotes: The constellations of the Dog and the Bull, he tells us, are plays on κὐνα (“dog”), which also means “le frein du prépuce,” and ταὐρῳ (“bull”) which can mean the perineum. As regards Hercules, he tells us, “La massue est un des noms grecs du membre viril.” The text, unfortunately, does not refer to Hercules’ club but to his wife. Although Peyrefitte’s notes are helpful, they are seldom adequate for researchers, who in this case would benefit from checking out the notes offered by Paton and other translators as well.

More casual readers, however, will probably find this poem obscure even with the explanations provided, and just move on. Perhaps that is why Peyrefitte’s translation was not received with due enthusiasm. A compromise between different readers’ needs does not work.

Possibly the effect of this poem could be mimicked by a series of astrological puns with sexual innuendos; but it is significant that both Paton and Peyrefitte resort to translator’s notes. No matter how a translator interprets such a poem, it is not directly translatable, and some explanation is needed.

The problem in 12.225 is insufficient understanding; but Hine’s version of 12.187 involves positive misinformation. The crux here lies in translating the enigmatic punch line at the end of this difficult poem. And it exemplifies how Hine and Peyrefitte, respectively, handle word plays. Hine usually substitutes a joke that works in English, whereas Peyrefitte explains the Greek joke in a footnote. Again, we may refer to Paton’s relatively literal translation:

How, Dionysius, shall you teach a boy to read when you do not even know how to make the transition from one note to another? You have passed so quickly from the highest note to a deep one, from the slightest rise to the most voluminous. Yet I bear you no grudge; only study, and striking both notes say Lambda and Alpha to the envious.

Paton adds a footnote on lambda and alpha: Probably, he says, they have “some sort of sexual meaning. There is double meaning in all the rest of the epigram, but it is somewhat obscure and had best remain so.”

With this touching expression of the scholarly devotion to knowledge which typified his age, Paton dismisses the epigram, leaving it quite untranslated as far as cross-cultural understanding is concerned.

Maxwell-Stuart and W.M. Clarke, (9) noticing a series of possible musical puns, (10) infer that the action is accompanied by instrumental music, and they elaborate fanciful interpretations of the action in each line based on this supposition. Significantly, however, their interpretations of the puns and action differ. Since ἀναγινώσκειν plainly means “to read,” I do not see any need to postulate instrumental music. Instead, I believe that the setting is a reading lesson and the tones in question are the polytonic accents of Greek being read aloud. Although polytonic accents may have been obsolescent in everyday speech at Strato’s time, they might still be observed in the schools. Aside from whatever additional layers of innuendo may be involved, at least some of the humour turns on the instructor’s flamboyant elocution. Hine appears to share this interpretation, and overall his translation expresses it fairly well:

How teach a boy that fundamental skill,

sight-reading, when your voice is changing still?

From shrill soprano to gruff bass you swoop

So quickly, from a whisper to a whoop.

But study harder, show the envious

Active and passive, Dionysius.

However, notice that, instead of explaining that Greek was polytonic and was read aloud, Hine has altered the scene of the poem to make it understandable to modern readers. There is no indication in the Greek that the instructor is a boy whose “voice is changing still.” This is no twelve-year-old teacher, but an effeminate grammaticus.

There is no consensus as to the meaning of “alpha and lambda” in the punch line. Peyrefitte suggests in a footnote that lambda is the first letter of the Greek word for “lick” and alpha the first letter of the word for “masturbate.” However, he does not mention other interpretations that are discussed by Maxwell-Stuart and Clarke. And an alert researcher may wish to know all of them, once he grasps the implications of Hine’s translation.

For, the translation “active and passive” would not be justified on most interpretations of lambda and alpha. “Licking,” for example, albeit perhaps beyond what was expected of the older, active partner and thus suggestive of lechery, would not imply full reciprocation.

Also the musical meaning of alpha and lambda, which represented high and low notes respectively—which is consistent with a polytonic reading lesson, as Greek used just two tones (the circumflex being transitional)—would not justify Hine’s translation. Neither does it seem to be Hine’s intent to express the original joke. Rather, this is a joke that fits the “reading lesson” setting in a way that is directly understandable—and amusing—to a modern reader. Unfortunately, it wrongly suggests a versatility of active and passive roles on the part of the speaker, while we have also been misled as to his age.

Given the obscurity of the original, a less specific innuendo, like “Show them all from A to Z,” might be better. Here again, however, precisely because the meaning of the poem is both obscure and disputed, some explanation is called for.

In 12.211, a man tries to seduce a slave boy. After all, he argues, you are not new to this. You gave it to your master, so why not give it to me? It won’t be so one-way with me, it will be more friendly and reciprocal. This poem touches a number of issues of interest to sexual historians: how men related to slave boys, their own and others’; to what extent the Archaic educational aspect of pederasty could still apply; and the issue of reciprocity.

The critical text for our purpose is line 4 in the Greek:

Why do you grudge giving it to another, and receiving the same?

In the Greek, the implication of ταὐτο λαβών (“receiving the same”) is clear. At this point in the poem, the boy can only understand this as an offer that if he puts out, he may screw his seducer. As the speech continues, however, this is watered down. He will have just as much fun, he is assured; but the only promise relating to who does what is that he will be asked, and not ordered. The implied offer to roll over for the boy would be a breach of the norm; and if it is dangled only to be withdrawn, the fact that a Greek reader would find this amusing is also significant. But Hine’s translation of ταὐτο λαβών misses this entirely (“Why not give someone else what you’ve got?”). And Peyrefitte—who writes “si la couche de ton maître t’a fait expert, pourquoi refuses-tu de donner à un autre, ayant reçu cela”—seems to refer ταὐτο λαβών to the boy’s instruction, rather than his penetration; but that is not “the same thing” that the boy will exchange with his seducer.

My comparison of Hine and Peyrefitte already suggests the approach that I would propose.

When Hine modifies a poem, we sometimes find more accurate background information in other translators’ footnotes. Some erotic translators have already felt compelled to resort occasionally to extensive notes. Hooper uses them in his translation of the Priapus poems, as did Barnstone in his Sappho. (11) I would take this farther. Translations of this kind of literature should be accompanied by an explicit analysis and commentary explaining the poem in its cultural context, and how the translation differs, and why—and perhaps also by a literal translation. An example of a commentary which is very close to what I have in mind is Reginald Gibbons’ notes on his translation of Luis Cernuda’s poem A un poeta muerto. (12) Gibbons describes the historical circumstances of the executions under Franco, discusses the different layers of meaning of a key Spanish word in the poem, and attempts to strike a balanced appreciation of the influence of Cernuda’s homosexuality on his feeling of alienation as an artist in this and other poems. However, I would place the commentary on the same page, so that the reader is invited, with equal convenience, either to read or to skip it.

Of course, a literal translation with a detailed commentary would not convey the “feel” of a poem. The best way to carry the thrust of a poem across a cultural gap is something poets have been doing for centuries: writing free adaptations inspired by their predecessors. A fully modern adaptation—a poem “after Strato”—would not, standing alone, convey historical content; but presented together with a literal translation and commentary, it can finally achieve a genuine cultural translation of the erotic and humorous thrust of the original.

As I have shown, Hine sometimes moves in this direction. His rendition of 12.233, for example, is not so much translation as adaptation. The original predicts how a proud young actor’s career will decline as he ages, playing on the titles of a series of plays by Menander. The boy regards his youth as a “Treasure,” but it will pass like a “Shade,” leaving him “Despised.” Hine substitutes famous movie titles: The boy will pass from “My Secret Garden” to the “Midnight Cowboy” when his beauty is “Gone with the Wind.” Another fine example of an adaptation which represents a cultural translation is J.D. McClatchy’s “Late Night Ode” after Horace, Carm. 4.1, (13) where, for example, the exemplary young advocate and lover Paulus Maximus is represented by “the blond boychick lawyer, entry level at eighty grand … [whose] answering machine always has room for one more.”

I have experimented with my proposal on 12.3.

A fairly literal translation might be:

Boys’ prongs, Diodorus, fall into three categories. Now learn their names:

Call the untouched one “lalu”; when it swells, call it “coco”; it’s a “liz-ard” when tossed in your hand. At the final stage, you know what it’s called.

The commentary which I would attach to my translation might read as follows:

The persona of this poem is instructing one Diodorus, who seems to be a neophyte in pederasty, on masturbating boys. Each of three stages from erection to orgasm is assigned a stereotyped babytalk term commonly applied to boys’ genitals. The babytalk is playful and suggests the youth of the quarry, as well as the apparent inexperience of Diodorus himself. At the same time, the sexual aspect is described vividly. The penis is “tossed” in the hand, where the word for “tossed” (σαλευομένην) is a vivid image for masturbation; defined by Liddell and Scott as “cause to rock, roll or vibrate … shake in measurement … roll, toss, move up and down,” the word is used, e.g., for the movement of ships in a storm. But the punch line, where the instructor notes cynically that Diodorus knows damned well what comes next, reveals that Diodorus is not so inexperienced after all.

In constructing a modern adaptation, babytalk will not work. It might suggest an inappropriate comparison with pre-teen pederasty, while its application to today’s street-wise teenagers would be silly.(14) Indeed, even the frank and playful attitude toward seducing adolescent males can hardly be expressed with an appropriately light tone in the discourse of the dominant (“straight”) culture. Translating for that culture would require bowdlerization. I would turn instead for inspiration to separate traditions of modern gay poetry and art which, regardless of their own differences from the Greek pederastic tradition, are better suited for reception of such epigrams, if only because of their more positive attitude toward same-sex relations, and indeed toward sex in general. To express the tone of this poem and the point of the punch line, we need a different set of stereotypes to replace the babytalk. I would use cliché lines from seduction scenes in pornographic videos, alternating with lines in a playful meter. And I would replace the enigmatic reference to a climactic name with a more familiar sequel in such videos. So my poem after Strato would read:

Now, Bruce, teenagers

come in three stages:

Learn how to make them

so you can take them.

When a boy’s erection

mounts up for inspection,

say …“Oh yeah …”

If he moans when your grip

slips his skin over the tip,

say … “Mmmm, you like that, don’t you …”

Next comes the best … but you know the rest;

Don’t talk with your mouth full!

However much this differs from the Greek epigram, both poems poke fun at familiar stereotypes and lead to an amusing revelation of the “neophyte”’s experienced status.

Looking briefly back at 12.211, it poses a difficult challenge. Apart from the aspects which I have already discussed, I do not think that modern readers can really relate to the slave situation. The very mention of a “master” may invoke an entirely different set of associations for modern readers which is not appropriate. I would be tempted, after a suitable commentary, to simply drop it and focus solely on the issue of reciprocity, which is still relevant for homosexuals today, and write something like this:

What are you afraid of?

You’ve been screwed before.

I know. You don’t like being treated as a whore; Taken for granted, left awake and hard.

Put out for me; I promise, you’ll enjoy it too.

We’ll romp and have a lively chat … with me on top of you.

I have chosen mainly passages relating to one aspect of the pederastic paradigm, viz., the issue of reciprocation. My discussion also applies, of course, to other issues. To cite one brief example, consider the question of the boys’ social status. The traditional view is that they were mainly nobility in the Archaic period, but slaves or prostitutes in Strato’s time. However, the beautiful youths in 12.195 are described as εὐγενέτας, “well born”—which Hine renders as “acclaimed.”

The approach of earlier generations to translating classical erotica combined untranslated passages for scholars with tedious literal renditions for the general reader. Newer versions like those by Hine and Peyrefitte mark great progress, but still do not serve well the varied needs of their modern readership. No translation can do everything for all readers, but I think we can do better. My intention in this paper has been to stimulate thought and discussion among translators and classicists about approaches which will better suit the different needs involved in the study of ancient sexuality, not to provide an instruction manual. Obviously, the right mix of analysis, translation and adaptation will vary for different poems and authors.

On the other hand, I shall venture to offer some very specific instructions for readers with a limited knowledge of Greek. You should do exactly as I have done in the present paper: consult at least two different translations. This simple precaution will reveal the extent of possible discrepancies, and confirm whether the nuance which is the core of your interest is present in the original or only in one translation. In the absence of a commentary by the translator, it may also be helpful to notice any indications of her or his own attitude on questions of interest, e.g., in other publications. And of course you should seriously consider better learning Greek.

 

Notes

(1) I am obliged to James Butrica and Beert Verstraete for reading draft versions of this paper. David Creese’s comments when I read it at the 2004 annual meeting of the Classical Association of Canada induced me to reconsider one of the passages discussed.

(2) Most recently, John R. Clarke, Roman Sex (New York 2003); for a concise account of this development, see Beert Verstraete, “New pedagogy on ancient pederasty,” The Gay and Lesbian Review 11.3 (May-June 2004) 13–14.

(3) E.g., William Armstrong Percy III, Pederasty and Pedagogy in ArchaicGreece (Urbana/Chicago 1996). 

(4) K.J. Dover, Greek Homosexuality (Cambridge MA 1978) 15 n. 30. 

 

(5) Felix Buffière, Eros adolescent (Paris 1980) 303–306.

(6) Daryl Hine, Puerilities (Princeton 2001).

(7) Roger Peyrefitte, La Muse garconnière (Paris 1973).

(8) W.R. Paton, trans., The Greek Anthology vol. IV (Cambridge MA 1971)

280–418.

(9) P.G. Maxwell-Stuart, “Strato and the Musa Puerilis,” Hermes 100 (1972)

215–240 and W.M. Clarke, “Problems in Strato’s Paidike Mousa,” AJP 99 (1978) 433–441.

(10) For example, the phrase ὰπ' ἰσχνοτάτης εἰς τάσιν ὀγκοτάτην,

“from the weakest to the strongest pitch,” may play on τάσιν = “tension,” i.e.,

with reference to an erection.

(11) Richard W. Hooper, The Priapus Poems (Urbana/Chicago 1999) and Willis Barnstone, Sappho (Garden City/New York 1965).

(12) Luis Cernuda, Selected Poems (New York 1999) 179–180.

(13) Michael Lassell and Elena Georgiou, The World in Us: Lesbian and Gay Poetry of the Next Wave (New York 2000) 195–196.

(14) Hine wisely avoids it. Yet his translation, though clever, does not really convey the situation: “Diodorus, boys’ things come in three shapes and sizes; learn them handily; when unstripped it’s a dick, but when stiff it’s a prick: wanked, you know what its nickname must be.” Why, the reader may ask, should the unstripped penis be called a dick, and the erect one a prick? What is the point? And indeed, what is its name when it climaxes? Culturally, this is not fully translated.

 

Review of Kelly Olson, Masculinity and Dress in Roman Antiquity, Routledge 2017

This little book is an excellent piece of scholarship. Olson, who has written a previous book on female clothing, has clearly mastered the field of Roman clothing, and dresses up her erudition in plentiful documentation. There are extensive notes and bibliography, and almost every matter in the text is illustrated with appropriate citations in Latin next to Olson’s astute translations. There is a summary at the beginning, and a conclusion at the end, of the book and each chapter. Previous research is acknowledged and a method is employed which weighs carefully the sometimes conflicting evidence of ancient literature and art. (Texts, Olson explains, could be ideological, describing how the writer thought men should dress, while art employed clothing-- not always realistically-- to represent the status of the subjects.)

Unfortunately there are occasional lapses of proofreading. Slips like “but is” for “but it is” (p.13) may be harmless, but the hapless undergraduate who tries to identify “Cornelius Neops” may be flummoxed.

Rome, as the author explains in her Conclusion, was a culture in which visual impressions were paramount. Hence Roman dress conveyed multivalent messages of rank, status and gender. Olson’s book is a thorough survey of Roman masculine clothing, but it is also aimed particularly at scholars of ancient sexuality and gender, who know how obsessed some Roman men were about standards of masculinity.

Possibly some such scholars did not know, for example, that although the toga signalled citizenship, it underwent variations in quality, in how it was worn, and even in style, which also revealed the wearer’s real or supposed wealth and status. This applies also to other articles of clothing. We learn some surprising facts: how clothes were “cleaned” in urine; how a slave wore expensively dyed scarlet to pass as a free man; how magistrates turned their toga backwards when passing a death sentence (cf. the black cap in Britain). These facts are interesting in themselves, but apparently some critics dismiss such details as ‘antiquarian’. Olson seems rather defensive on this point, fending off the charge of ‘antiquarianism’ (which, like ‘essentialism’, seems to be regarded as a label which can refute automatically without any ratiocination) by arguing that one should know all aspects of clothing before understanding the messages about class and gender. I would go further: The entire field of classical studies is antiquarian by definition, and just as in the physical sciences, which are indisputably untainted by antiquarianism, one must learn the facts for their own sake first before finding applications. A historian interpreting the dynamics of a Roman trial, for example, should know that defendants were expected to appear shabbily dressed in order to gain sympathy.

But perhaps the most important sartorial feature revealed by Olson is ambivalence. There was a complex of authentic and fake messages: garments worn by equestrians but also by pseudo-equestrian imposters, items or colours that could signify wealth and/or effeminacy, etc. Olson traces a constant rear-guard struggle by aristocrats to discredit wealthy upstarts encroaching on their prestige, which partly accounted for Roman authors’ praise of plain and simple garb.

After examining the complex codes of clothing and gender, and in particular the concept of effeminacy, Olson very plausibly suggests recognizing a separate social category that could be blurred with pathic homosexuals: viz., ‘dandies’, urban young men of fashion (mainly aristocrats) who were more interested in sex with women. She cites the terms trossulus and comptulus as referring to them, and reinforces her proposal by comparing pre-modern (17^th to 19^th centuries) notions of effeminacy described by historian Randolph Trumbach and queer theorist Alan Sinfield.

There is one issue which Olson has not treated adequately: legislation. We are told repeatedly that there was “no established legal hierarchy of clothing”, yet unauthorized men are said to be “illegally wearing” certain items. For example, while p. 19 refers to a senator’s right by law to wear wide stripes, p. 20 states that the width of the stripes was not regulated in any way. Emperors, in particular, are described several times as allowing or prohibiting various sartorial practices. Olson differentiates between legal and social sanctions, and includes a brief discussion of sumptuary laws; but it would be better to have a section clarifying the role and/or absence of legal sanctions and enforcement.

This book is valuable for gender scholars, but also delightful reading for disinterested ‘antiquarians’ like classicists.

Review of Lucrezio, la Natura e la Scienzia, ed. Marco Beretta and Francesco Citti, Florence 2008

Review of Lucrezio, la Natura e la Scienzia, ed. Marco Beretta and Francesco Citti, Florence 2008

(review copyright James Jope)

This volume, edited by Marco Beretta and Francesco Citti, comprises papers from an interdisciplinary conference between departments of the History of Science and Latin Literature on November 16 2006 in Ravenna.

Table of Contents

MARCO BERETTA – FRANCESCO CITTI, Premessa . . . . . . . . . . . . Page V

ANNA ANGELI – TIZIANO DORANDI, Gli Epicurei e la geometria. Un

progetto di geometria antieuclidea nel Giardino di Epicuro? . ................... » 1

LISA PIAZZI, Atomismo e polemica filosofica: Lucrezio e i Presocra-

tici . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ................................... » 11

IVANO DIONIGI, Lucretius, or the Grammar of the Cosmos . . . . ..........    » 27

GIOVANNI DI PASQUALE, Il concetto di machina mundi in Lucrezio...     .» 35

ELISA ROMANO, Tempo della storia, tempo della scienza: innovazio-

ne e progresso in Lucrezio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .........................» 51

PHILIP HARDIE, Lucretian multiple explanations and their reception

in Latin didactic and epic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ............................. » 69

FRANCESCO CITTI, Pierio recubans Lucretius antro: sulla fortuna

umanistica di Lucrezio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ............................» 97

MICHELE CAMEROTA, Galileo, Lucrezio e l’atomismo . . . . . . . . .....     » 141

MARCO BERETTA, Gli scienziati e l’edizione del De rerum natura ...     » 177

Index of names. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ........................» 225

There is no consistent policy regarding translating quotations. In Elisa Romano’s article, for example, Italian translations precede the Latin quotations, whereas Philip Hardie provides no translations, not even for Greek. This circumstance suggests that the editors made no extensive effort of coordination. However, cross-references indicate that contributors were well aware of the other papers, although some are rewritten from previously published versions.

Two outstanding, complementary reception studies by the editors are the foremost feature, so that I shall begin with them. Both are meticulously documented surveys of material which could suffice for longer monographs. (In fact, Marco Beretta later published La rivoluzione culturale di Lucrezio: Filosofia e scienza nell’antica Roma.)

Beretta’s survey here focuses on Lucretius’ influence on scientists from the middle ages into the 20^th century. To avoid (1) taking expressions of admiration for influence or (2) projecting modern ideas back, Beretta takes as the thread of his narrative editions of DRN (De Rerum Natura). Although he perhaps does not always strictly observe (1), this is a very fertile new angle, and by its very nature it makes his essay interdisciplinary.

It might be argued that some of the scientists cited do commit error (2), for example, when they identify Lucretius’ minimae partes with electrons, or the clinamen with indeterminacy in quantum physics. Perhaps an exception is Albert Einstein’s essay in Hermann Diels’ edition, which ascribes to Lucretius only prophetic intuition. But however questionable some citations may be, they do illustrate Beretta’s point that DRN was read not just as a poem but as a serious text for science.

To mention just one of the interesting findings in this survey: Pierre Gassendi edited fragments of Epicurus (1649) as well as Lucretius, whom he read until he was “presto a conoscere a memoria”, and he compared atomism with the findings of seventeenth-century experimental science. While Gassendi is commonly cited in general surveys of atomist influence, the Italian physician Giovanni Nardi had published his edition of DRN two years earlier, and it was the first edition by a scientist and with a scientific publisher. Although Nardi was a (moderate) Aristotelean, he found atomism more useful, e.g., to explain the plague which hit Florence in 1630.

An interesting section of Beretta’s paper traces ecclesiastical moves to suppress Lucretius’ influence. When Alessandro Marchetti completed the first Italian translation of DRN in1667 its publication was blocked by the Church, which placed DRN on the index of forbidden books. After several manoevers, it was finally published posthumously in England in 1717. Censorship was less direct, but still vexacious in the Protestant countries. Authors would purge the ‘impious’ content from Lucretius and elaborate a Christian version of atomism (God created the atoms, etc.) Newton’s letters reveal that he was considering writing a commendation of Lucretius, but he was warned not to publish it. Regrettably, this section could provide food for thought today as censorship is on the rise (political correctness, avoiding ‘offending’ anybody, etc.)

The title of Francesco Citti’s survey (Pierio recubans Lucretius antro) quotes an elegy written in 1447 by the humanist Pontanus (Giovanni Pontano), which also imitates Lucretius’ language. Citti’s survey complements Beretta’s by focusing on humanists. While many Renaissance humanists initially assumed, and even amplified, Jerome’s libel, others imitated Lucretius’ poetry extensively. Partly in order to express Greek scientific language, and partly too for metrical facility, Lucretius coined many hapax legomena, which provide a key for tracing Lucretius’ influence in the Renaissance texts. Citti offers an updated list of 116 of these neologisms--a valuable contribution in itself--on pp. 110-113, and then examines several interesting cases of humanists’ use of them. “In generale i composti ricevono una maggiore attenzione per la loro natura poetica, indipendentemente dal contesto originario”. (Citti seems to equate ‘neologisms’ with ‘hapax legomena’, which is not literally correct if the word is copied by a subsequent classical author.)

To mention just one example: Marcantonio Flaminio used Lucretius’ Latin translations of Empedocles’ terminology on Love and Strife in his own adaptation of Empedocles’ Greek.

Throughout the article, the author moves with impressive ease between Classical literature and Renaissance figures with whom most classicists, at least outside of Italy, will not be acquainted.

The other papers may be discussed in the order of their appearance.

Angeli and Dorandi attempt to reconstruct mathematical works, as well as argumentation regarding geometrical principles, by Epicureans from Epicurus to Lucretius, including fragmentary evidence, some of it recently obtained from the library of Philodemus at Herculaneum. Epicureans argued for the impossibility of the infinite divisibility postulated by Euclidian geometry, since it was incompatible with the Epicurean concept of indivisible minimae partes.

Lisa Piazzi examines both literary and philosophical aspects of Lucretius’ criticism of Presocratic philosophers in DRN I 635-920. She correctly observes that, in the tradition of Aristotelean doxography, he regards them only as atomist precursors. She contrasts Lucretius’ polemical abuse with the civility of Platonic and Ciceronian dialogue, and likens it to diatribe. Again, the comparison may be appropriate, but her apparent comfort with the dialogue writers seems rather naive. Plato’s dialogues are rigged; Socrates’ irony is notorious; and Cicero found ways to insinuate his own judgments into his dialogues.

Ivano Dionigi’s article is an English translation of a study published previously in Italian (for the complete reference, see the footnote on p. 27.) Its inclusion in a volume written mainly in Italian seems odd, especially since its interdisciplinary content relates more to comparative literature than to science.

Lucretius describes the way atoms combine to form different materials through concursus, motus, ordo, positura and figura (DRN II 1021). Referring to Heinrich Keil’s Grammatici Latini, Dionigi argues that these are all technical terms of Latin rhetoric, which leads him to highlight some interesting linguistic aspects of DRN. While it is plausible that Roman readers may have thought of the rhetorical usage when reading Lucretius, we can hardly be certain. The terms are physical in their primary meaning and in their use with reference to the atoms; and the author’s references to Italo Calvino and Gustav Flaubert do not corroborate his argument.

Giovanni di Pasquale’s innovative study contextualizes Lucretius’ machina mundi within a conceptual matrix linking philosophy with technology and engineering. Construction was the principal image of technology in the ancient world, but motion too became important from the Hellenistic period. Philosophers as early as the Presocratics were fond of mechanical models, and the author provides a detailed picture of some of these. Spheres, in particular, suggested mechanical models of a perpetual universe driven by god, but Lucretius’ model is mortal and driven by chance. The author shares the view that Lucretius goes beyond Epicurus and reflects contemporary Roman preoccupations when he believes that our world is old and in decline and its structural balance is fragile.

Elisa Romano explores apparent inconsistencies in Lucretius’ attitude toward newness or change, in what she calls a fenomenologia lucreziana della novità, e.g. in the repetitive cycle of life and death in nature, or in the development of civilization in book V. Lucretius shares the fear of change that gripped Romans in his day, but it is both underpinned and modified by Epicurean ethical theory.

Epicureans offered multiple alternative explanations for phenomena which could not be definitively explained, in order to keep people from resorting to supernatural explanations. Philip Hardie locates Lucretius’ multiple explanations in the context of Greek and Roman poetry. Similar multiple explanations were customary in poetry as early as Homer, but there they could include supernatural as well as natural causes. Roman poets after Lucretius continued the practice and imitated Lucretius’ language as well, but they too would not rule out supernatural causes.

Although Hardie certainly demonstrates that the Epicurean practice overlapped with an established poetic tradition, I would suggest that we can approach a better philosophical understanding of this issue if we ask why Epicurus adapted this very figure which was commonly used by the poets. He would hardly have followed their lead out of admiration. Multiple explanations, whether offered by epic poets, by Epicureans, by scientists discussing as yet unresolved phenomena, or by modern scholars who wish to skirt a disputed issue that they need not resolve in a given context, always pertain to matters for which they do not know the definite answer. Whether or not an epic poet actually supposed that a god intervened, the parallel expression of human and divine motivations was an obvious way to insinuate the divine into a narrative of human action. Perhaps Homeric bards were actually uncertain about gods meddling, whereas the Roman authors were simply reverting to the standard practice of the epic genre. In any case, Epicurus may have wished to challenge the poetic convention by using the very same device to exclude divine intervention rather than accommodate it.

Michele Camerota scrutinizes Galileo’s own writings and controversies during his career for evidence of Lucretian influence. Galileo owned two copies of DRN, but never referred to Lucretius explicitly. His views on the structure of matter were compatible with atomism, favouring quantitative and mechanical explanations against the qualitative and teleological views of the Aristoteleans. However, his own views are sometimes obscure and problematical. For example, he ascribed the specific weight of different materials to the density of ‘minimal particles’ inside them, but he avoided discussing the existence of the void. Camerota admits that Galileo’s interest in Lucretius can not be conclusively demonstrated, but his investigation is still constructive.

Interdisciplinary research between Classics and science (investigations of climate change in antiquity, etc.) has augmented since the turn of the millennium, and this book is a welcome step in that trend.

Latin American Idiomatic Expressions

  (Terminology Update, Volume 33, Number 1, 2000, page 13)

Latin American news stories are peppered with colourful proverbial and idiomatic expressions. Such expressions are subject to fashions. Only those which survive to become international clichés are likely to be found in printed dictionaries, and the translations offered there may be inelegant or out of date. For example, if we follow the Harper Collins Spanish Dictionary, we should translate sacar los trapos al sol (literally, "airing their rags in the sun") as "taking their skeletons out of the cupboard"; why not "washing their dirty linen in public"?

The meaning of new expressions which are not in the dictionaries is not always obvious to the uninitiated. Unless these expressions are stored in a constantly updated data bank, one has to consult an eminent Latin American colleague (luckily, we have several of these in the Translation Bureau’s Multilingual Translation Directorate). Even if the meaning is known, it may be difficult to find a translation which does it justice in the target language. Colombian guerrillas have coined the expression pesca milagrosa (literally, "miraculous fishing") for their favourite sport of abducting civilians to hold for ransom. I have not found a catchy phrase for this in English. Perhaps one might restructure the sentence to refer, with quotation marks, to " ’going fishing’ for hostages."

Sometimes an expression is characteristic of a certain region. A Colombian journalist whose Ecuadorian interlocutor said of persistent demonstrators, "A Mahuad están midiendo el aceite" (literally, "They are checking Mahuad’s oil"—i.e., testing his mettle), commented that this was a Colombian expression.

When a writer wishes to caution the reader that a person’s threats should be taken seriously, he may write, No está cañando. "He’s not whistling Dixie" would render the colour nicely, at least in American English.

Some expressions have to be altered just a little in translation in order, as it were, to naturalize them; two examples are dar el visto bueno, which may be rendered as "to give a green light" to some action, and Aún no se puede cantar victoria—"It’s not time to celebrate yet." An event which agarró… todos los guatemaltecos con los calzones en la mano, "caught all Guatemalans with their pants down" (literally, with their pants "in their hands").

For others, there is a completely equivalent, albeit quite different, English idiom. I have translated la gota que rebosará una copa ya casi llena (literally, "the drop which will cause an already nearly full cup to overflow") as "the straw that broke the camel’s back"; and No les tiembla el pulso para matar (literally, "Their pulse does not waver when they kill") as "They kill without batting an eyelash." The tendency of expressions to vary is exemplified by one Colombian farmer’s variation: "No me tiembla el culo."

The constantly changing corpus of proverbial and idiomatic expressions and the need, when translating, to match the right colloquial level and convey the appropriate irony make this a logical subject for computerized data banks and online dictionaries, which can be regularly updated.

Approaches to Lucretius: --- a Review

                     © Copyright: James Jope

Approaches to Lucretius: Traditions and Innovations in Reading the De Rerum Natura [DRN] (2020, ed. Donncha O’Rourke) evolved from a conference on Lucretius in Theory at the University of Edinburgh in 2013. The innovations comprise a sampling of diverse critical theories employed in the study of Lucretius (as well as other classical authors) in recent decades. O’Rourke’s excellent introduction sketches the history of this scholarship and gives not only a summary, but some interesting additional information for each essay. The chapters are roughly grouped according to method: Author and Reader (“vaguely narratology”), atomology (after Friedländer), allusion (by an author) and intertextuality (perceived by the reader–although usually intended by the author). David Sedley did not contribute to the present volume, but should be mentioned as an eminence grise; several essays allude to or discuss his thesis that DRN is derived solely from Epicurus’ Peri Physeos. Sedley’s work might be classed as Quellenforschung (searching out source texts) albeit with the novel feature that the supposed source text is not fully extant and has to be reconstructed.

The most traditional essay–so much so that it seems to stand apart in this collection, showing, as it were, how classicists had to work up the text from the extant manuscripts before the literary theorists could amuse themselves with it–is an exemplary study in textual criticism. In Critical Responses to the Most Difficult Textual Problem in Lucretius, David Butterfield tackles the issue of the opening hymn to Venus followed by its apparent disavowal. First he sketches the problems in the manuscript tradition and scholarly debate since the Renaissance, then argues logically and systematically to his own solution: He postulates that there must have been a marginal note pointing out the correct Epicurean doctrine in the lost manuscript copied by our archetype, which the archetype then incorporated into the main text. Regrettably, Butterfield also exhibits nearly rude impatience, describing rival arguments as, e,g, “rhetorical bluster” (p. 30) or “perverse” (p. 34)–a propensity which has not been uncommon in the long history of textual criticism.

In Reading the ‘Implied Author’ in Lucretius’ DRN, Nora Goldschmidt applies Wayne Booth’s concept of the ‘implied author’. After Roland Barthes murdered ‘The Author’, leaving ‘The Reader’ in control of the text, Booth assisted The Reader by suggesting an ‘Implied Author’. Like the ‘persona’ or the ‘narrator’, the implied author has, of course, nothing to do with Titus Lucretius Carus; rather, it is the overall impression created by the reading of the text. Goldschmidt considers three apparently autobiographical passages about writing the DRN. Noting the ‘labor’ and ‘furor’ associated with composing a Latin poetic expression of Epicureanism, she surprisingly infers that Lucretius did not have peace of mind , i.e., he betrays an element of anti-Lucrèce. This is strange, because no matter how we translate these words, it seems clear from the context that Lucretius enjoyed his work. But surely the overall impression after reading the entire DRN is the static pleasure of contemplating the cosmic cycle with a new understanding.

Barnaby Taylor’s Common Ground in Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura resembles close reading, but not of a continuous passage. Rather, he examines short passages throughout the text which use the first person plural. Differentiating inclusive (the reader is part of ‘we’), exclusive (the reader is not part of ‘we’) and collective (reader and author belong to some larger group) uses, he shows persuasively how Lucretius’ didactic technique of “mutual exploration... between... teacher and student” works differently but effectively for both uninitiated beginners and fully instructed Epicureans.

The concept of ‘distributed cognition’ in Coming to Know Epicurus’ Truth: Distributed Cognition in Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura by Fabio Tutrone comes from Cognitive Science. It refers to the modern view (as opposed to Cartesian dualism) that knowledge does not reside solely inside the mind; rather, it involves the external world in connection with the brain. It is probably fairly obvious to students of epicureanism that the atomist theory of mind and the senses falls into this category. Tutrone is more concerned with convincing ‘cognitive scientists’, who, like so many modern intellectuals, like to assume that they had no ancient predecessors. His case is strong, but his determination to express it in cognitive scientists’ terms is embarrassing: “[the] DRN... is construed by Lucretius as a distributed cognitive artefact” (p. 94). While historical scholars will be shocked by the anachronism, “death of the author” enthusiasts may find its attribution to the intention of Titus Lucretius Carus disappointing.

In an important digression, Tutrone persuasively defends the ‘realist’ view of Epicurean gods (they exist) against the ‘idealist’ view (they are mental constructs).

Infinity, Enclosure and False Closure in Lucretius’De Rerum Natura is the editor’s own contribution. After discussing the comprehensible and incomprehensible aspects of the concept of infinity, he suggests some ways in which Lucretius’ poetry conveys a sense of infinity: for example, the ‘endless’ series of proofs of the mortality of the soul, which “seems to go on forever”. O’Rourke draws on various sources from Ovid to Umberto Eco, but not, as far as I know, on any particular school of literary criticism. Although he does show a deeper understanding of the philosophical issue than some classicists, this is essentially a standard piece of classical scholarship, and a good one.
 
Lucretian Echoes: Sound as Metaphor for Literary Allusion in De Rerum Natura: Jason Nethercut proposes a neat instance of the epicurean principle that poetic form and content should correlate. Previous scholars have noticed allusions to the Homeric Hymn to Pan and later texts in Lucretius’ discussion of echo in 4.549-94, but Nethercut argues that Lucretius makes those later texts ‘echo’ the Hymn. His argument is rather speculative and owes much to others (Philodemus, Schiescaro). Can it be backed up by similar passages elsewhere in DRN? The more are found, the stronger the case. Nethercut’s conclusion seems to recognize this.
 
Saussure’s cahiers and Lucretius’ elementa: A Reconsideration of the Letters–Atoms Analogy:
Wilson H. Shearin calls for a reconsideration of the dominant interpretations of the analogy famously explored by Friedländer between the many ways in which atoms/letters can combine to form different compounds/words. His point–without Saussure–is that the dominant views miss some implications of the analogy, in particular the creative potentiality of the atoms suggested by Lucretius’ term genitalia corpora. A point well taken. Unfortunately, he proposes as a model of creative potential Saussure’s so-called ‘anagrams’, an admittedly arbitrary “game” to find theme words hidden in the text. Thus, from

     . . sed Eo magiS acrem
    inritat animi virtutem, effringere ut arta
    natURaE Primus portarum claustra CUPIret. (DRN I 69-71)

the eminent Swiss sorcerer conjured Epicurus’ name. It is sad to see an intelligent scholar turning to such frivolity for inspiration.

Arguing over Text(s): Master-Texts vs. Intertexts in the Criticism of Lucretius by
A. D. Morrison describes two kinds of readers who regard Lucretius’ use of his sources in different ways. ‘Master text’ sources are considered superordinate and the epigone is checked against them. This approach is more common among philosophers, and David Sedley’s thesis positing Peri Physeos as Lucretius’ source text is an example. Intertextuality is the dominant approach among students of Latin poetry, who see their authors as responding to, perhaps even correcting, his source texts. Morrison wishes to avoid polemics and concludes that the DRN can accommodate diverse readers. However, he shows that it does make a difference, and he notes that Roman readers themselves (e.g., Ovid) engaged more in intertextuality. This paper is actually a kind of ‘meta-scholarship’, reflecting on the assumptions implicit in different critical approaches–a beneficial and productive exercise that should happen more often.

Lucretius and the Philosophical Use of Literary Persuasion by Tim O’Keefe: In spite of the unconventional professorial image on Tim’s home page, this is a sober attempt to defend Lucretius’ originality by modulating some influential positions which tend to diminish it. First, O’Keefe argues that the debate over whether Lucretius only copied from Epicurus (Sedley looms here once again) or tailored his arguments against contemporary (esp. Stoic) sources can not be resolved, because the source texts are lacking and because Lucretius favored ‘catch-all’ arguments directed at anyone who shared a given position. Then he considers the poet’s use of emotive images and ridicule, which Martha Nussbaum would class with Epicureans’ irrational indoctrination practices. Comparing Cicero, who shows his originality by intervening in his dialogues, O’Keefe argues that Lucretius uses such moves only to remove popular Roman psychological barriers to his arguments, not to replace the reasoning. “In his use of literary and rhetorical methods of persuasion alongside his argumentation, Lucretius alone among the Epicureans shows a sensitivity for needing to present his arguments in a way that also takes into account the biases, stereotypes, and other psychological factors that hinder his audience from accepting the healing gospel of Epicurus.” Whether this constitutes philosophical originality is disputable, but it certainly means that Lucretius was what he set out to be–a first-rate popularizer.

The Rising and Setting Soul in Lucretius, De Rerum Natura: Emma Gee draws an intriguing comparison between Lucretius on souls and Cicero in his Aratea on stars, studying “the interaction of Lucretius’ text with Cicero’s” in its effect on the reader. Lucretius, she argues, subverts Cicero’s and other Stoic texts to which he alludes by altering their philosophical orientation.

This is an intertextual study. There seem to be two major differences between Quellenforschung and intertextuality: (1) Quellenforschung is old and therefore bad, and intertextuality is new and therefore good; (2) Intertextuality involves not only the authors, but especially The Reader. There is, however, a question about intertextuality which puzzles me: Is The Reader a contemporary Roman or a modern polymath? Granted that ancient authors, and Roman poets in particular, read, mined, and strove to upstage their predecessors, can we really assume that they always thought of the same allusions seen by the scholar?

Some of the verbal echoes cited by Gee are rare outside of the compared texts, but others are not. For example, Cicero’s quarum ego nunc nequeo tortos evolvere cursus becomes Lucretius’ quorum ego nunc nequeo caecas exponere causas. The echo effect depends mainly on the first four words, which are common words and likely to be combined in this way for metrical reasons. Like Nethercut’s essay, this would benefit from further instances.       

Was Memmius a Good King? by Joseph Farrell: If researching historical background to better understand literature is a ‘method’, classicists have been using it before, during, and after its discouragement by New Critics (remember them?). Astutely combining historical expertise and literary sensitivity, Farrell compares DRN with Philodemus’ treatise on how to be a good king, by investigating their addressees. Piso was a successful politician, and Philodemus was his dependent (cliens). Memmius was Lucretius’ equal in the Roman social hierarchy and a failure. That is why his teacher is much less indulgent than Piso’s. Farrell even “would not exclude the possibility that Lucretius chose Memmius as his addressee precisely because Memmius’ behaviour reflected so badly not just on himself but on the entire Roman political class, particularly in their relaxed attitude towards living the philosophies that they claimed to espouse.” (239) A notable example of the above ‘astute combination’ concerns DRN 3.992-3, where Tityos is in amore iacentem while having his innards savaged in Hades as punishment for attempting to rape Leto. This, of course, happened only after his crime. The image during the punishment is grotesquely inappropriate. But Lucretius wishes to allegorize the myth as representing the pain of passion... because sexual misconduct played a major part in Memmius’ downfall.                   

A Tribute to a Hero: Marx’s Interpretation of Epicurus in his Dissertation by Elizabeth Asmis is a ‘reception’study, i.e., it concerns the influence of classical authors later in history and in our day. ‘Reception’ has become fashionable partly because it helps classicists keep their jobs, but the reason why it is really needed is clear from Asmis’ observation that “Marx’s dissertation has received much attention from students of Marxism.  There has been very little attention, on the other hand, from students of ancient philosophy.” (241-2) Marx’s interpretation takes the random ‘swerve’ of the atoms as the key to free consciousness, which, evolving along enigmatic Hegelian paths, ultimately surpasses concrete reality. Asmis follows carefully, tracing Hegel’s influence and comparing modern scholarship and ancient evidence, to sift out what is valuable in Marx’s insight. Having consulted her scholarship over the years, I would have thought her well suited for this delicate task, and I am not disappointed.

Plato and Lucretius on the Theoretical Subject by Duncan F. Kennedy offers a critical view of Epicureanism based on its supposed resemblance to Plato, which is well presented rhetorically but so unsound that I must resort to a more polemical style to describe it.

Comparing Plato’s Cave myth with Lucretius’ image of Epicurus as heroic, Kennedy concludes that both philosophies are “metaphysical” because they claim to know the ultimate nature of ‘being’ (viz., the Ideas for Plato and the atoms for Epicurus) on the authority of a privileged reporter or prophet. This definition of ‘metaphysics’ muddles the critical difference: Atomism is verifiable, at least in principle, albeit not yet with ancient technology; the Ideas are not.

Metaphysics, Kennedy continues, is associated with violence, which he finds in the image of religio trodden under foot. But what about the goal of ataraxia (peace of mind)? Apart from the indoctrination alleged by Nussbaum–itself very mild compared with the history of religions–the closest Epicureanism comes to violence is in its calm acceptance of the self-inflicted troubles of the ignorant (suave mari magno etc.) Using the metaphorical image of defeated religio to label Epicureanism as violent is simply not fair.

Kennedy finds in Plato a model of thinking as dialogue, and sees the same model in Lucretius because of the way in which the poet often addresses his reader. What about the entire tradition of didactic poetry going back to the presocratics, and Lucretius’ place in it, which Monica Gale has explored so well?

The weakness of these arguments is hardly compensated by the array of authorities cited, from Socrates to Hannah Arendt. The most prominent of these is Latour, cited as surpassing Lucretius and metaphysics because he “suggests” precisely fifteen (15) different modes of ‘being’. His philosophy too is unconvincing, at least as presented here.

I am indebted to Donncha O’Rourke and his contributors for the opportunity to refresh my acquaintance with Lucretian scholarship through these intriguing essays.

Comments? Questions?        jamesjope@jamesjope.ca

Review of Philip R. Bosman, ed., Intellectual and Empire in Greco-Roman Antiquity, Routledge 2019

Review of Philip R. Bosman, ed., Intellectual and Empire in Greco-Roman Antiquity, Routledge 2019     

©James Jope

Editor Philip Bosman states in his preface, “The collection of articles in this volume results from a conference with the same title, held in October 2014 in Pretoria, South Africa. The conference’s aim was to explore the interactions, literary and real, between the broad categories of wisdom and power in antiquity.” Bosman’s introduction provides useful summaries of the respective papers, and acknowledges that in the published volume, the focus is mainly on the Hellenistic and Roman periods. This restriction is unfortunate, as it excludes some of the most familiar ancient examples of power vs. intellect: e.g., poets and tyrants in Archaic Greece, the judicial murder of Socrates, or Aristotle’s challenging relations with his pupil Alexander as well as the Athenian democratic regime. The democratic instances in particular might have been more promising for reflecting on modern analogies.

Actually, there are conspicuous omissions even within the declared scope: There is nothing about the activities of the Scipionic Circle and Panaetius’ sanitation of Stoic ethics, nothing about Seneca and Nero, nothing about the periodic expulsions of philosophers from Rome or Stoic opposition to the emperors. What we do find is an interesting series of papers on sidelines or supplements to studying the famous cases.

Some of these ‘alternative’ papers (the term is my own) investigate interesting cases, but there is no coherent overall survey of the Roman period, so that the reader who desires a continuous framework will find it only for the Hellenistic period, in Francesca Schironi’s study. With only very reasonable bits of speculation, she deftly extracts from scanty evidence a survey of the intellectual patronage of Hellenistic kings in order compare the Ptolemies’ museum and library with the patronage of other dynasties. Schironi differentiates pure research (mathematics, astronomy) from useful arts (physicians, tutors). While other dynasties emphasized the useful, the Ptolemies cultivated a broader range, striving to establish their Greekness as successors of Alexander.

Clive Chandler defends the Epicurean Diogenes of Seleucia under Alexander Balas as a good Epicurean slandered by Stoic sources. This is not the famed Diogenes who asked Alexander the Great to step out of the sun, but a less known ‘alternative’. Philodemus, who would have been the obvious choice to represent the Epicureans, is mentioned only in passing.

As an ‘alternative’ to discussing Plato’s misadventures with Dion of Syracuse, Evans compares Plutarch with earlier sources to trace the origins of the mythical aura gracing Plutarch’s Dion. Dion, he finds, was actually a mediocre individual who was exalted because of his association with Plato.

Augustus’ management of intellectuals is another obvious area of interest. For this, we have Livia Capponi’s study of the historian Timagenes of Alexandria. Timagenes was banned from the house of Augustus after offending the latter, then burned the books which he had written about Augustus. Capponi offers a detailed study of Timagenes’ life, which was not uninteresting. But his offence and his punishment were both trivial compared to other victims of Augustus, Ovid in particular. And of course, the Augustan government’s positive exploitation of cooperative poets, too, would have been of interest.

An innovative alternative to spilling more ink on Ovid’s ambivalence concerning the emperors is Sanjaya Thakur’s thorough assessment of the historical accuracy of the poet’s trumpeting of Tiberian propaganda to ingratiate himself with the emperor. Comparison with senatus consulta etc. reveals that Ovid’s efforts are not just superficial panegyric, but a carefully crafted reflection of contemporary events and ideology-- so much so that they offer useful evidence on the actual history of the period.

Plutarch is a likely source of subjects for this book’s theme. Mallory Monaco Caterine’s paper on his Life of Aratus shows how Plutarch, while narrating Aratus’ ill-fated relationship with Philip of Macedon, offers advice and examples of how to mentor kings and advocate local interests. Caterine argues plausibly that it must have been written for the benefit of Greeks dealing with Roman authorities. Her findings correspond nicely with those of Katarzyna Jazdzewska, who finds certain patterns of ruler relations in Philostratus’ Lives of the Sophists: While philosophers might advise rulers with frankness (parrhesia), sophists should ‘enchant’ them with rhetorical persuasion, advocating for local interests and criticizing only with ‘figured speech’, if at all.

Two papers relate to Marcus Aurelius.

Noelle Zeiner-Carmichael analyses the correspondence between Aurelius and Fronto, his teacher of Latin rhetoric, showing that in the competitive intellectual environment of the Second Sophistic, and throughout the changes in their relationship as Marcus came to value philosophy rather than rhetoric, Fronto always defended the importance of Latin rhetoric and his own supremacy in it. Her rhetorical analysis of the letters is persuasive, but she evades the controversy over whether the letters were intended for publication, by simply assuming that they were. She also evades, as irrelevant, the dispute over whether theirs was an erotic relationship, although if it was, that should surely affect interpretation of the letters.

Ewen Bowie writes on Aurelius’ attitude toward Greek poets and sophists-- again avoiding the most notable case, namely Herodes Atticus. Although the Meditations suggests a generally dim view of sophists, Philostratus’ anecdotes reveal the emperor’s likes and dislikes. He responded quickly when an earthquake struck Smyrna, probably because he was moved (‘enchanted’) by Aelius Aristides’ advocacy. He may also have favoured two young men, Hermogenes and Theodotus, because he found them erotically attractive.

Also Lucian of Samosata is the subject of two essays.

One contribution that does not shy from a disputed issue is Heinz-Guenther Nesselrath’s on Lucian’s attitude toward Romans. Nesselrath wisely limits his paper to examining Lucian’s portrayal of Roman imperial officials, which he presents as balanced; some officials are reasonable, some foolish, but the imperial system itself seems to be accepted as an unalterable fact of life. However, in my opinion, this need not be inconsistent with the contempt for social and cultural aspects of Roman society exhibited in works like the Nigrinus. Lucian would have had to be more tactful when writing about imperial officials.

Balbina Baebler’s contribution on Lucian’s Imagines is a brief, but cogent argument that this verbal construction of an ideal image by selecting body parts from different statues is not serious art criticism (ekphrasis) but a parody of the method: The final product would not produce any coherent image at all. For example, in the statue from which some parts are supposedly taken, they are hidden beneath clothing.

John Hilton’s essay on Julian and the Cynics compares their relationship and Hydaspes’ with the gymnosophists in the Aethiopica, but it seems to be more concerned with dating and interpreting the romance than with the non-fictional side of the comparison.

Several of these articles can stand alone as worthy contributions, however specialized. Whether the shift to “alternatives” is a constructive innovation or a shortcoming, I shall leave for the reader to decide. However, this book will be of greater interest to experienced readers already acquainted with the outlines of encounters between wisdom and power in the ancient world than to those desiring an introduction to the subject.

Comments? Questions?        jamesjope@jamesjope.ca 

Eros in Anacreontea 1

Eros in Anacreontea 1¹

Copyright James Jope

This paper examines the neglected erotic content of Anacreontea 1, which suggests that the speaker is chosen for induction to Anacreontic poetry as an eromenos of Anacreon, and explores its relevance for the Anacreontic collection.

The Anacreontea are a collection of poems once attributed to Anacreon which were largely neglected after they were shown to be spurious. They have attracted greater interest since Patricia Rosenmeyer, in her influential literary interpretation of this collection, described it as a tradition of authors imitating Anacreon not as rivals (the norm in ancient literature) but as admirers. Although Anacreon himself had also written invective, his followers from the Hellenistic to the Byzantine emulated an image of Anacreon which was essentially restricted to his erotic and symposiastic interests. According to Andrew Lear (2008), Anacreon himself set a precedent for this narrowed range, as he adopted a sort of ‘alternative’ symposiastic lifestyle, apolitical and carefree, driven by pleasure and eschewing engagement in ‘serious’ pursuits. The Anacreontic poems are set in a laid-back fantasy world of vinous indulgence and erotic desire where toil (ponoi), and cares (merimnas) are eschewed². A keynote is struck by Poem 2, calling for Homer's lyre but without the bloody chord. As a corollary of this withdrawal, the Anacreontics, like some of Anacreon's own poems, describe what Felix Budelmann³ calls 'transferable' experiences: generic situations with little to tie them to a particular time or place.

Considerations of meter and dialect indicate that the Anacreontea comprise two previous anthologies⁴: a Hellenistic collection comprising mainly erotic poems, and a later anthology of mostly symposiastic poems. It is generally agreed that Poem 1 belongs to the earliest stratum, where it introduced the first collection; whereas Poem 2 may have introduced the second.⁵ The speaker recounts a dream in which he encounters, and is gifted by, Anacreon:

Ἀνακρέων ἰδών με

ὁ Τήϊος μελωιδὁς

(ὂναρ λἐγω) προσεῖπεν ̇

κἀγὼ δραμὼν πρὸς αὐτόν

περιπλάκην φιλήσας.

γέρων μὲν ἦν, καλός δέ,

καλός δὲ καὶ φίλευνος ̇

τὸ χείλος ὦζεν οἴνου ̇

τρέμοντα δ’ αὐτὸν ἤδη

Ἔρως ἐχειραγώγει.

ὃ δ’ ἐξελὼν καρήνου

ἐμοὶ στέφος δίδωσι ̇

τὸ δ’ ὦζ’ Ἀνακρέοντος.

ἐγὼ δ’ ὁ μωρὸς ἄρας

ἐδησάμην μεtώπωι ̇

καὶ δῆθεν ἄχρι καὶ νῦν

ἔρωτος οὐ πέπαυμαι.

ed. West 1984

“Anacreon, the melodious singer from Teos, spotted me (in a dream) and called to me. And I ran over and wrapped my arms around him and kissed him. He was old, it is true, but handsome—handsome, and amorous too. His lips smelled of wine, and he was already trembling, but Eros led him by the hand. He took the garland off his head to give it to me. And it smelled of Anacreon. I, like a fool, took it up and tied it around my head; and from that moment to this very day I have been in love constantly.” (my translation)

To paraphrase: Anacreon calls the speaker, probably at a symposium⁶. The speaker runs over, throws his arms around Anacreon and kisses him, observing that Anacreon may be old, but he is good-looking, and amorous⁷ too. Anacreon's kiss tastes of wine, and he is unsteady; but Eros leads him by the hand. Anacreon removes the garland from his own head and gives it to the speaker, who, noticing that it smells of Anacreon, “foolishly” (moros) puts it on his own head, and has been a lover ever since.

The common interpretation sees the dream simply as a poetic investiture, with Anacreon in the role of the muse and the garland conveying inspiration⁸. This is incomplete. Garlands were commonly a gift of paederastic lovers. Scholars have taken little notice of the erotic aspect, some endeavouring to rationalize it away. K. Bartol⁹ argues that poetic investiture excludes erotics; whereas in fact they are interwoven here. Glenn W. Most¹⁰ suggests that the speaker is cast as Anacreon's eromenos, but he does not explore the implications of this trope.

This is a queer investiture indeed--not an encounter with serious divinities like those which inspired epic or didactic poetry, but, I shall argue, an appropriately seriocomical induction to the insouciant genre of Anacreontic lyric. Ignoring the erotic content has unnecessarily problematized the poem. Why a garland? which, as even Bartol concedes, is more reminiscent of paederastic courtship than of poetic investiture. Why does the speaker feel that he was foolish to accept the gift? Some answer¹¹ that the writer has suffered from the burden of writing the poetry inspired here; but the only aspect of the Anacreontic poems that is burdensome is erotic passion, not writing the poems. In fact, Poem 60 advocates writing poetry to allay that passion. What mysterious words did Anacreon say to his epigone, and why is there no report of specific instructions like those given by the Muses to Hesiod? But if this is also an erotic encounter, the point is simply that Anacreon initiates it, as erastai conventionally did. The opening line of an erotic encounter-- especially by a drunken lover-- is often trivial. Finally, what is the role of Anacreon himself? He is not divine or immortal, yet he can inspire.¹² But unlike the Muses, Anacreon inspires by example. Anacreon himself pursued the life of pleasure and composed this kind of poetry. And the project of the Anacreontic poets is to follow his example.

Let us look again at the speaker’s dream. When the author runs to kiss Anacreon, this could be simply philia. But it is Eros who leads Anacreon to offer his garland to the author, and lest there be any doubt about the flavour even of poetic inspiration imparted under this god's tutelage, the author cites an olfactory stimulus: The garland smells of Anacreon: the musky scent of the man after drinking and dancing¹³. And the speaker reacts to his scent not with aversion, but by eagerly taking and wearing the garland. The signals of erotic motivation are too clear for the scene to involve only a conventional poetic investiture.

Anacreon, the speaker says, is old, but still good-looking (kalos). This cannot mean, in this context, as Bartol¹⁴ suggests, that he resembles more conventional agents of inspiration like the Muses in some aspect other than physical attractiveness. The word here means precisely physical attractiveness. Rosenmeyer¹⁵ mentions that an early statue of Anacreon emphasized his virility, and that even though he is pictured as old, at least one vase painting seems to label him kalos. Paul Zanker describes a type of portrait statue which he calls the 'handsome old man' (kalos geron). This type began in portraits of Homer, but was later used for others. Regarding Homer, Zanker writes:

Old age does not carry negative connotations here... Signs of decrepitude in the cheeks, temples, and the... eyes are indicated with the utmost discretion. This Homer is a handsome old man... full of dignity... beauty and nobility. (p. 16)

A Periclean statue of Anacreon was influenced by this type. Portrayed as a symposiast, he is shown nude,

...with a handsome, ageless physique. Only ...subtle hints of advancing age. (p. 25)

...his nudity celebrates the perfection of the body, just as those of younger men. (p. 30)

If our poet envisioned Anacreon in this way, his attraction is understandable. And it is likely that he did so. This portrait type was followed in Hellenistic copies; and Hellenistic literary texts often alluded and responded to familiar statuary.¹⁶

Some Anacreontic poems feature comical scenes. Eros too can be targeted, although his power can still assert itself. For example, in Poem 6 he is small enough to be swallowed by the poet, and Poem 35 mocks his childishness. Poem 1 too has a comical strain. The inebriated old man needing help to walk, and the speaker's eager response (too eager by some Greeks’ standards) are comical images, as is especially Eros assuming the role of a slave or kindly helper by guiding the old man; anyone acquainted with these and other Hellenistic poems well knows that the sneaky little god must be up to mischief. But the amorous old drunk fits the stereotype of Anacreon throughout this collection. And the eagerness of the speaker shows that he is expressing genuine admiration and attraction. These comic features may signal that the eroticism need not be taken too seriously: It is rather a pointed symbol of the literary liaison of the epigone with Anacreon. The author’s devotion to his model is like that of a responsive eromenos to his suitor and mentor.

Of course we do not know the author's age in real life.¹⁷ But he was certainly younger than Anacreon, whether we mean the image or the poet. And he sees himself as an admirer who here becomes inspired. We seem to have here an expression, perhaps a recollection, or at any rate a representation of erotic love for the older poet by a presumably youthful poet about to embark on his creative career. And it is a 'transferable' experience which other poets aspiring to imitate Anacreon could have shared. Hence its suitability as an introductory poem.

This erotically mediated literary succession must have reminded Greek readers of educational paederasty. After all, the young man acquires his mentor’s expertise in love and poetry.

But Greek readers would also notice a difference. Educational relationships, like the philosophical pederasty advocated by the early Stoics¹⁸ or even athletic training¹⁹ would always involve prolonged and laborious training-- like the cares (merimnas) and toils (ponoi) eschewed by Anacreontic poets. Anacreon himself had abandoned the educational function along with other ‘serious’ pursuits.²⁰ And the Anacreontic poems repeatedly reject arduous learning in favour of quick inspiration by eros or wine. In Poem 49 wine “teaches” the poet to dance. In 52, the poet rejects the rules and rigours (anankas) of the rhetors for such easy learning. In 58, the poet's temptation to pursue wealth occurs when his heart (thymos), not his brain, encourages him to “think big” (hyperphronein). And in Poem 19 Eros himself does not wish to leave the service of Beauty, because he has been taught (dedidaktai)—i.e., conditioned, obviously by pleasure rather than study-- to serve. All of these poems exhibit a rejection of arduous learning and a preference for heady inspiration. But here, precisely, is an Anacreontic style of succession: Anacreon hands over the garland under the god’s oversight and the eromenos instantly morphs into an erastes. Here there is no instruction, only inspiration. Anacreon offers both the benefit of educational paederasty and the ease of impulsive liaisons. His lessons have no exercises.

Those who would interpret the poem simply as a poetic investiture puzzle over how Anacreon had the power to convey inspiration. But there is no need to ascribe any preternatural power to Anacreon. The competent deity himself (Eros) is present. And he is obviously manipulating the event; for, the result of the encounter is that the speaker cannot cease to be a lover (erotos). The text does not say “to love Anacreon” or “to write poems” (though he does both). The surprising result of inspiration in Poem 1, viz., that the dreamer becomes not just a poet, but a lover, is less surprising if we remember that Poem 1 belongs to the first, predominantly erotic collection, and that the Anacreontea imitate Anacreon’s ‘alternative lifestyle’ as well as his poetry²¹. Poem 60, at the end of the Anacreontea, contains the often quoted exhortation “Imitate Anacreon” (ton Anakreontea mimou). What that poem advocates specifically is writing erotic poetry as a safe way to mitigate searing passion. It is desire (eros) that produces both the creativity of Anacreontic poets and the anxiety which the final poem seeks to mitigate, and which of course explains why the speaker in Poem 1 was ‘foolish’ to accept the garland.

In our poem, and throughout the collection, Anacreon is a role model. Our poet’s attitude resembles that of a young admirer who desires to follow in his footsteps. Close attention to the erotic motif has clarified previously problematized issues about this poem; it casts new light on the devotion of Anacreontic poets to their model, and incidentally provides a rare glimpse of the motivations which a responsive eromenos might have felt. Anacreon here is a role model, an erastes, and a mentor; but all of these are human attributes. Since the preternatural influence which transfers his poetic talent operates by making the younger poet too an erastes, it must come from the god. In spite of the playful treatment of Eros in our poem, it is he who is the ultimate source of inspiration and the presiding deity. If the speaker’s enthusiasm expresses itself as erotic attraction when he becomes excited at the sudden appearance of his handsome model, this would not seem so unusual in Hellenistic Greece as it might today. In the Anacreontic setting, however, it is more than appropriate.

The poem, incidentally, also throws light upon the response of boys in a pederastic relationship. The representation of an eromenos in the first person singular, even if the words ascribed to him are projected by an older author, is rare in the literature. But here we have a plausible and positive representation of the subjective experience (dream) of a responsive youth.

Comments? Questions?        jamesjope@jamesjope.ca

Notes

1.This article originated as a presentation at the annual meeting of the Classical Association of Canada in Quebec City, 2016. Thanks to William A. Percy for bringing the Anacreontea to my attention, and to Robert Fowler and Beert Verstraete for advice on initiating my research.  

2 Rosenmeyer also stresses the absence of violence and of consummated sex. However, there are exceptions. The violence of Eros shooting the poet in the gut in Poems 13 and 33 is as graphic as an epic battle scene, although it may be intended to parody such. And the rape in Poem 59: 20-24 is consummated, with serious consequences. West 1984: 46 notes: “puellae suadetur... innuptae videlicet: nuptias igitur sponsas tantum prodere potest.” While it is true that sex is usually not consummated, this it is hardly an exclusive feature of these poems; it motivates perhaps most love poetry.

3 Budelmann 2009: 234-235

4 West op.cit.: pages XVI-XVII. For the argument based on dialects see also Sens (2014).

5 For detailed discussion of the composition and dates of the collection see Campbell, D.A. 1988: 14-18 and Edmonds, J.M.: 1-16.

6 The setting of the dream is not described. Most Anacreontic poems are set at a symposium, and there is no reason why Poem 1 should be an exception. Anacreon has been drinking, and dancing (hence his scent).

7 phileunos: “amorous” is my translation. LSJ translate this as “fond of the marriage bed”, but there is no reference to marriage either in the word itself or in this poem. Edmonds emends to philoinos, arguing that the context concerns drinking; but the reference to drinking is only one detail of this erotic investiture. Rosenmeyer translates “good in bed”, but the word denotes fondness for rather than skill at making love.

8 Thus Rosenmeyer 1993 and Bartol 1993. For more detailed discussion of the erotic content--albeit still without acknowledging its importance--see Brioso Sánchez 1979, who argues that Anacreon's portrayal simply epitomizes his standard characteristics. But this does not explain the role of Eros and the behaviour of the speaker. 

 

9 Bartol 1993: 68 recognizes “eine deutliche Anspielung auf das sympotische Modell einer homosexuellen Situation” but insists that “das Bild kann aber zugleich anders interpretiert werden”.

10 Most

11 Bartol op. cit.: 69; cf. Rosenmeyer op. cit.: 67.

12 Gutzwiller 2014: 54-56 cites evidence that Anacreon may have been treated as a hero in the Hellenistic period, but I see no indication of that in this particular poem.

13 Readers who consider the suggestion of sweat repugnant have postulated that the scent is of wine or of myrrh. These undoubtedly sweetened the bouquet, but the text says only that the garland smelled of Anacreon.

14 op. cit. 69

15 op. cit. 28-29

16 Gutzwiller discusses several instances of Hellenistic epigrams relating to statues of Anacreon. The essays collected by Evelyne Prioux and Agnès Rouveret 2010 explore in depth cross-references between the literary and plastic media in the Hellenistic period.

17 More than one scholar believe that an Anacreontic persona may be at least quasi-autobiographical. Alexander Rudolph 2014: 131-144 argues that the 'I' in these poems is more real than fictitious, because the literary setting is anchored in the social setting of the symposium, where the speaker plays a type role that could be experienced by any of the participants.

18 For the sexual ethics of the early Stoics see Schofield 1991 3-56.

19 For the athletics, see Hubbard 2003.

20 As Lear explains, the educational side of pederasty was a ‘serious’ social duty. Stehle 2014: 250 suggests that Anacreon avoided educational involvement because of its political repercussions, as he was hosted by tyrants. The two motives need not be mutually exclusive.

21 For the imitation of the Anacreontic lifestyle see also, e.g., Glenn W. Most 2014: 151.

References

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