Post on 31-Dec-2015
JUVENAL
Raging against corpses…
The Flavian dynasty
• Titus Flavius Vespasianus
• Suppressed the Jewish revolt 66 CE
• Became emperor in 70 C.E.
• His sons, Titus and Domitian followed him
Titus
• Crushed the Jewish revolt in 70 CE
• Funded numerous public buildings in Rome
• Helped the victims of the eruption of Vesuvius in 79
• Disastrous administrator
• Avid spectator of games…
• Persecutor of Jews and Christians
QuickTime™ and aTIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
Domitian
Decimus Iunius Iuvenalis
• 1st 2nd CE• Writing after the death of DOMITIAN• good rhetorical training• little interest in philosophy • Sixteen satires in hexameter, subdivided into five
books.
Juvenal
Si natura negat, facit indignatio versus…
• Juvenal criticizes: – corruption of the political and social life in
Rome– stupidity of contemporary literature indulging
in mythological stories
Goals
• Satire cannot help anyone become a better or happier person.
• Horace’s answers are invalid
Tragic Satire
• Juvenal’s Satires are inhabited by monstra, rather than by comic characters
Style
• Shocking contrasts between lofty and obscene
• Surprising statements:
– Quid Romae faciam? Mentiri necio! (3.41)
– What should I do in Rome? I am bad at lying.
• Rare words
• Ambiguity
• Dense and memorable formulations:
– probitas laudatur et alget (1.74)
– Honesty is praised but not imitated
Structure of Satire 1
• Introduction: reasons for writing (1-21)
• Exposition : reasons for writing satire
(22-80)
• Exposition 2: the main vices (81-146)
• Conclusion: reasons for illustrations from the past (147-171)
2. Symmetry versus chaos
• Juvenal’s subject is life itself and life is chaotic
• He makes his points covertly
• Like a good teacher he comes back to the same topic several times
• In doing so he also follows the principles of rhetoric
3. Monstrous City
• Gallery of male freaks– Eunuch getting married– Foreigners who ‘made it’ (Crispinus)– Informers– Actors
Gallery of female freaks– Poisoners– Incestuous Adulteresses
• Wealth comes from crime
• “Indignation would make me a poet, even if I have no talent”
4. Objects of Satire
• Greed
• Sexual perversions mentioned here – (but not important later)
4. Main vices
• Vices associated with wealth and prestige– Stinginess– Extravagance
• Contrasted with the position of the poor
• Injustice inherent in the patron-client relationship
5. We have achieved a peak in vice
• Posterity can hardly add anything…• My book is a pot-pourri of human vices
– The rich who gamble their fortunes
– The poor watch magistrates and women in litters
– Dependants spend all days hanging around their patron
6. Examples
• Take these examples from the past:– Mucius (Scaevola attacked by Lucilius)– Tigellinus (Nero’s henchman)
7. Ending
• Should the crooks go free?
• It is dangerous to write satire.
• Attack Tigellinus and you will be burned alive…
• So I will attack the dead
Tigellinus
• Handsome and wealthy Sicilian
• Became Nero’s prefect of the praetorians in 62 CE
• Forced to commit suicide after Nero’s fall
• 30 years before Juvenal is writing…