III JUVENAL'S USE OF EPIC FOR Imitations of epic style and of individual passages from epic form a larger element in the style of Juvenal's satires than has perhaps been realized. Juvenal imitates epic sometimes in all seriousness in his loftier flights, but quite as frequently employs epic style to give mock seriousness to his commonplace subjects. While the use of epic parody is quite legitimate in satire as a form of humor, nevertheless a great amount of epic style even humorously used gives a certain loftiness of tone to the whole. In the present chapter I shall consider epic parody in Juvenal, both the parodies of actual epic passages and the more general parody of the grand style of epic. Since the passages to be cited are all humorous, I shall classify them as far as possible according to Cicero's classification1 of the different forms of wit, both as a convenient method of arranging them and as showing something of ancient ideas of humor. Among the different means of attaining humorous effect Cicero names first the device of deceiving the hearer's expectations, "expectationibus decipiendis" technically known as πаρà τроσdοkíαν. This form of wit is illustrated in Juvenal's frequent oxymora, such as "descendere in caelum" (VI 622); "fruitur dis iratis" (I 49); "ipse rotam adstringit sufflamine mulio consul" (VIII 148); "evertere domos totas optantibus ipsis di faciles" (X 7). In the parodies of epic this humorous deceiving of expectations lies chiefly in the use of a well known epic phrase, not particularly for the purpose of mock dignity but simply by way of surprise, as in the line, "iam poscit aquam, iam frivola transfert Ucalegon" (III 198), or in "nullus tibi parvolus aula luserit Aeneas" (V 137–8). 1 Cicero's classification is in De Oratore II, 264 ff., especially 289. Cf. Wilkins's note on II, 264. 2 De Orat. II, 289. 46 The second form of wit is caricature, which consists in exaggeration, either "augendi causa" or "minuendi causa". By the nature of things, parody will fall mostly within this category. The parody consists in applying an epic phrase to a trivial or a ridiculous subject for the sake of giving it a mock dignity, and is therefore "augendi causa"; or in the midst of a lofty flight of epic parody the style drops suddenly into the ludicrous by the use of a colloquial or commonplace expression, as in III, 118, where the colloquial word "caballus" is introduced into a passage which burlesques epic style: senex ripa nutritus in illa, ad quam Gorgonei delapsa est pinna caballi. There is a combination of purpose in the reference to the pleader as a "pallidus Aaix” (VII, 115), and the mention of the "bubulco iudice" in the same passage is "minuendi causa". This device of parodying loftiness by exaggeration and then suddenly dropping to the ludicrous by "diminution" is not by any means confined to passages of epic parody; it is one of Juvenal's favorite tricks of wit, occurring again and again throughout the satires. Almost all of Juvenal's hyperboles, except those which arise from indignation, are examples of this type of humor. The exaggerated picture of the gorgeous triumph in X, 38-40: ferentem ex umeris aulaea togae magnaeque coronae tantum orbem, quanto cervix non sufficit ulla, is "augendi causa", while the exaggeration of the poverty of Demosthenes's father for the sake of contrast with the son's glory, is "minuendi causa": quem pater ardentis massae fuligine lippus The two purposes are often combined, as in De Orat. II, 267. • Sometimes the epic phrase is used not so much to give mock loftiness to the trivial subject as to make the well known epic phrase appear ridiculous by the incongruity of context. In such cases the parody is both "augendi" and "minuendi causa." 'X, 130-2. nam qui dabat olim X, 78-81: imperium fasces legiones omnia, nunc se continet atque duas tantum res anxius optat, panem et circenses. The third method of attaining humorous effect is by comparison with something ridiculous or ugly, "similitudine turpioris". This type of humor occurs occasionally in Juvenal's epic parodies, as in the comparison of Priam to an ox, "ut vetulus bos" (X, 268), or in the application of the Homeric simile of the swallow's nestling to the aged man (X, 231). This device is used less frequently than most of the others. Dissimulatio, or irony, Cicero defines in the modern sense of saying with apparent seriousness something contrary to what is actually meant: "alia dicuntur ac sentias, non illo genere, de quo ante dixi, cum contraria dicas. . . . sed cum toto genere orationis severe ludas, cum aliter sentias ac loquare." Since a great part of parody, particularly that included under caricature, is irony in this sense of speaking insincerely with apparent seriousness, it will be neither necessary nor possible to consider under a separate category the epic parody used for the sake of irony. Parody in itself might almost be considered as one form of irony. Very close to irony is the form of humor termed "assumed simplicity": "valde haec ridentur et hercule omnia, quae a prudentibus quasi per simulationem non intellegendi subabsurde salseque dicuntur". Only very seldom can "assumed simplicity" in parody be distinguished from the parody which is ironical. It also is usually co-extensive with caricature. The sixth method of raising a laugh is by the lashing of folly, stulta reprehendo, and occurs so continually in the satires as to require no comment. All the invective which borders on Bwμoloxía, and there is much of half humorous, half indignant attack,-belongs in this category. It is not illustrated, obviously, in the passages parodying epic. Of these different devices of humor, the one most commonly employed in parody is caricature, under the two rubrics of De Orat. II, 269. 7 De Orat. II, 275. "minuendi" and "augendi causa". Since the parody of caricature is always exaggerated for the sake of humor and yet spoken with apparent sincerity, the same examples usually include both caricature and irony. Again, a sudden fall into the ridiculous in the midst of an epic flight is usually both "minuendi causa" and Tарà πроσdокíαν. Thus the different categories παρὰ προσδοκίαν. often overlap, and a classification of the instances of parody in Juvenal must be a classification of convenience rather than of perfect logic. The first use of epic to be considered is parody in the most obvious form, which aims to lend a mock dignity to a commonplace subject and is therefore "augendi causa”. I, 42 ff.: et sic palleat ut nudis pressit qui calcibus anguem, parodies the well known simile of both Homer and Virgil, Iliad III, 33-5: ὡς δ' ὅτε τίς τε δράκοντα ἰδὼν παλίνορσος ἀπέστη and Aen. II, 379–80.: improvisum aspris veluti qui sentibus anguem pressit humi nitens trepidusque repente refugit. Applied here to the pallor of the reprobate, the epic simile is of course used in mockery. II, 25: quis caelum terris non misceat et mare caelo, which occurs again in slightly different form in VI, 283: clames licet et mare caelo confundas, homo sum, is used by Juvenal as a stock expression to describe anger. It parodies a common epic description of a storm, such as Aen. V, 790: maria omnia caelo miscuit Aeoliis nequiquam freta procellis. In Valerius Flaccus's Argonautica, I, 586-587, the winds are described as soliti miscere polumque infelixque fretum. But that the expression was also used in the same sense as in Juvenal is shown by Lucretius, III, 840 ff.: scilicet haud nobis quicquam, qui non erimus tum, accidere omnino poterit sensumque movere, non si terra mari miscebitur et mare caelo. The description of the poor man sitting on the banks of the Styx (III, 265 ff.): iam sedet in ripa taetrumque novicius horret while not a close parody, distinctly recalls Virgil's lines of Aen. VI, 325 ff.: haec omnis, quam cernis, inops inhumataque turba est; The "taetrum porthmea" of Juvenal's description suggests Virgil's characterization of the ferryman (Aen. VI, 298–9): portitor has horrendas aquas et flumina servat terribili squalore Charon; and the descriptive phrase "caenosi gurgitis alnum" is like Aen. VI, 296: turbidus hic caeno vastaque voragine gurges. The invocation to the muse in IV, 34 ff.: incipe, Calliope, licet et considere. non est cantandum, res vera agitur: narrate, puellae Pierides. prosit mihi vos dixisse puellas, is a travesty of the customary epic invocation, such as prodite, Calliope, famae quos horrida coepta.....8 The last line of Juvenal's invocation, "prosit mihi vos dixisse puellas", is introduced "minuendi causa", to make the whole ludicrous. This mock epic invocation to the muse is not unpre Cf. Aen. IX, 525; Silius Italicus, Punica III, 222; XII, 390. Horace parodies this epic invocation to the muse in Serm. I, 5, 51 ff. |