The World of the Hero Teaching the politics of
Description: The World of the Hero Teaching the politics of Virgils Aeneid Prof. Victoria Rimell, Warwick 1.7.2019 optimistic pessimistic readings Aeneid as pro anti-Augustan The role of epic in inculcating values and ideals more generally
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slide1. The World of the Hero Teaching the politics of Virgil’s Aeneid
Prof. Victoria Rimell, Warwick 1.7.2019<br>
slide2. ‘optimistic’/ ‘pessimistic’ readings Aeneid as pro/ anti-Augustan The role of epic in inculcating values and ideals more generally Typical questions:
The main purpose of divine intervention in the Aeneid is to glorify Rome: do you agree?
Do the characters of the Aeneid display Roman values?
Does Aeneas become an Augustan hero, or hero ‘worthy of Augustus’?
Is the main purpose of divine intervention in the Aeneid to glorify Rome?<br>
slide3. The political, and epic as an art form A totalising form that strives towards a conclusion where all has been achieved?
A baggy, ‘maximising’ form whose scale and ambition means it is always encompassing ‘further voices’?
An either-or question?<br>
slide4. What are we doing anyway? Still guardians of tradition, viewing epic poems as embodying truths and aesthetic-political values to be revered and internalised rather than questioned?
The history of reading the Aeneid as subversive, pessimistic or ‘anti-Augustan’ is tied up with questioning the politics of classics as a field of study deeply implicated in imperialism, colonialism and the education of elite white men.
I.e. ‘The politics of Augustan poetry is inextricably linked with the politics of talking about it’ (Kennedy 1997, p.27)<br>
slide5. Under the shadow of ‘propaganda’ The Aeneid is not an extended propagandistic textbook
It wasn’t ‘commissioned’ by Augustus; Virgil wasn’t compelled to say only what cohered with the wishes and interests of the emperor and his patron Maecenas
It’s reductive and unhelpful to begin by thinking we must decide whether Virgil was really for or against Augustus
Literary texts are not in any case straightforward manifestations of conscious authorial intention
Conventionally we tend to look on Augustus as a person, but ‘he was more significant as an idea’ (Kennedy)
‘Augustan ideology’ emerged as a collective invention, a set of forces, conflicting desires, ambitions<br>
slide6. Resistance and power<br>
slide7. ‘…the clear cut distinction between “Augustan” and “anti-Augustan” breaks down. Arising from a static theory of language, it overlooks the fact that, whatever the author’s intention or however great his desire, no statement (not even made by Augustus himself) can be categorically “Augustan” or “anti-Augustan”; the traces of its constituent discourses were, and still are, open to appropriation in the opposite interest.’
D. Kennedy 1997 pp.40-41.
‘The ideology of a regime that presented itself as a paradoxical “monarchic Republic” was shaped in such a way as to accommodate patent oppositions and contradictions while encompassing the totality of Rome’s post-crisis political discourse.’
E. Giusti, Carthage in Virgil’s Aeneid, 2018, p11.<br>
slide8. Political appropriations now<br>
slide9. https://rogueclassicism.com/2011/01/20/latin-intelligence/ SIR LAWRENCE FREEDMAN: What were your views of the final report of Duelfer’s? SIS4: “Sunt lacrimae rerum”, really. SIR LAWRENCE FREEDMAN: Would you like to elaborate? SIS4: I think it says it all. SIR LAWRENCE FREEDMAN: All right. We will stop there. THE CHAIRMAN: “Tendebantque manus, ulteriore amore.” Shall we break for ten minutes? SIS4: Yes, that would be lovely.<br>
slide10. Differing perspectives: the oblique view Think in terms of…
TIME: heroic time - Augustan time; the ‘future’ foretold from a distinctive perspective
CHARACTERISATION: Doubling, trauma, civil war
PHILOSOPHICAL TROPES and DIALOGUES BETWEEN ‘SCHOOLS’: e.g. Stoic vs/with Aristotelian approaches to anger.<br>
slide11. R. Tarrant, ‘Poetry and power’ in Cambridge Companion (new ed. 2019) ‘To see signs in Virgil of an ambivalent or pessimistic outlook is not to read him anachronistically. In fact, while explicit interpretation of the Aeneid along these lines is a relatively recent development, the aspects of the poem to which an ambivalent or pessimistic reading responds can claim to be the most basic or permanent, having their origins in the poem’s conception of human nature. An optimistic or Augustan view, on the other hand, highlights elements of the poem that ultimately depend on a contingent set of historical circumstances, the hopes for renewal and stability raised by the ascent of Augustus. In that light, what calls for explanation is less the fact that critics in the middle and late twentieth century began to articulate a pessimistic view of the Aeneid than that an optimistic consensus prevailed for so long. Since Virgil’s optimism is linked to his pride in Rome and his hopes for its future, a positive view of the Aeneid’s import requires a reader who either shares that pride or for whom the concept of Rome carries an equivalently powerful value. In other words, just as the grounds for hope within the poem are historically contingent, so too is the perspective needed to read the poem optimistically. (p259-60)
???<br>
Prof. Victoria Rimell, Warwick 1.7.2019<br>
slide2. ‘optimistic’/ ‘pessimistic’ readings Aeneid as pro/ anti-Augustan The role of epic in inculcating values and ideals more generally Typical questions:
The main purpose of divine intervention in the Aeneid is to glorify Rome: do you agree?
Do the characters of the Aeneid display Roman values?
Does Aeneas become an Augustan hero, or hero ‘worthy of Augustus’?
Is the main purpose of divine intervention in the Aeneid to glorify Rome?<br>
slide3. The political, and epic as an art form A totalising form that strives towards a conclusion where all has been achieved?
A baggy, ‘maximising’ form whose scale and ambition means it is always encompassing ‘further voices’?
An either-or question?<br>
slide4. What are we doing anyway? Still guardians of tradition, viewing epic poems as embodying truths and aesthetic-political values to be revered and internalised rather than questioned?
The history of reading the Aeneid as subversive, pessimistic or ‘anti-Augustan’ is tied up with questioning the politics of classics as a field of study deeply implicated in imperialism, colonialism and the education of elite white men.
I.e. ‘The politics of Augustan poetry is inextricably linked with the politics of talking about it’ (Kennedy 1997, p.27)<br>
slide5. Under the shadow of ‘propaganda’ The Aeneid is not an extended propagandistic textbook
It wasn’t ‘commissioned’ by Augustus; Virgil wasn’t compelled to say only what cohered with the wishes and interests of the emperor and his patron Maecenas
It’s reductive and unhelpful to begin by thinking we must decide whether Virgil was really for or against Augustus
Literary texts are not in any case straightforward manifestations of conscious authorial intention
Conventionally we tend to look on Augustus as a person, but ‘he was more significant as an idea’ (Kennedy)
‘Augustan ideology’ emerged as a collective invention, a set of forces, conflicting desires, ambitions<br>
slide6. Resistance and power<br>
slide7. ‘…the clear cut distinction between “Augustan” and “anti-Augustan” breaks down. Arising from a static theory of language, it overlooks the fact that, whatever the author’s intention or however great his desire, no statement (not even made by Augustus himself) can be categorically “Augustan” or “anti-Augustan”; the traces of its constituent discourses were, and still are, open to appropriation in the opposite interest.’
D. Kennedy 1997 pp.40-41.
‘The ideology of a regime that presented itself as a paradoxical “monarchic Republic” was shaped in such a way as to accommodate patent oppositions and contradictions while encompassing the totality of Rome’s post-crisis political discourse.’
E. Giusti, Carthage in Virgil’s Aeneid, 2018, p11.<br>
slide8. Political appropriations now<br>
slide9. https://rogueclassicism.com/2011/01/20/latin-intelligence/ SIR LAWRENCE FREEDMAN: What were your views of the final report of Duelfer’s? SIS4: “Sunt lacrimae rerum”, really. SIR LAWRENCE FREEDMAN: Would you like to elaborate? SIS4: I think it says it all. SIR LAWRENCE FREEDMAN: All right. We will stop there. THE CHAIRMAN: “Tendebantque manus, ulteriore amore.” Shall we break for ten minutes? SIS4: Yes, that would be lovely.<br>
slide10. Differing perspectives: the oblique view Think in terms of…
TIME: heroic time - Augustan time; the ‘future’ foretold from a distinctive perspective
CHARACTERISATION: Doubling, trauma, civil war
PHILOSOPHICAL TROPES and DIALOGUES BETWEEN ‘SCHOOLS’: e.g. Stoic vs/with Aristotelian approaches to anger.<br>
slide11. R. Tarrant, ‘Poetry and power’ in Cambridge Companion (new ed. 2019) ‘To see signs in Virgil of an ambivalent or pessimistic outlook is not to read him anachronistically. In fact, while explicit interpretation of the Aeneid along these lines is a relatively recent development, the aspects of the poem to which an ambivalent or pessimistic reading responds can claim to be the most basic or permanent, having their origins in the poem’s conception of human nature. An optimistic or Augustan view, on the other hand, highlights elements of the poem that ultimately depend on a contingent set of historical circumstances, the hopes for renewal and stability raised by the ascent of Augustus. In that light, what calls for explanation is less the fact that critics in the middle and late twentieth century began to articulate a pessimistic view of the Aeneid than that an optimistic consensus prevailed for so long. Since Virgil’s optimism is linked to his pride in Rome and his hopes for its future, a positive view of the Aeneid’s import requires a reader who either shares that pride or for whom the concept of Rome carries an equivalently powerful value. In other words, just as the grounds for hope within the poem are historically contingent, so too is the perspective needed to read the poem optimistically. (p259-60)
???<br>