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‘Against Interpretation’: Petronius and art Criticism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 July 2014

Niall W. Slater
Niall W. Slater*
Affiliation:
University of Southern California
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Extract

For forty years a debate has raged in Petronian studies between the moralists and, for want of a better term, the anti-moralists. From Highet in the 1940's to Bacon and Arrowsmith in the 1950's and 60's, the moralists held a certain advantage. Whatever important divergences there were among these critics, all agreed on a Petronius who stood in some critical relation to his society. The dissenting voices have grown much louder of late. Ironically, the literary brilliance of Arrowsmith's New Critical reading of the Satyricon helped to turn the tide against the moralist viewpoint. The more apparent the literary sophistication of the Satyricon has become, the less willing late twentieth century readers have been to see a programmatic moral critique as its main purpose. Sullivan's view of Petronius as a ‘literary opportunist’ has come to dominate the field.

With Graham Anderson's book, Eros Sophistes: Ancient Novelists at Play, the retreat from the position of Highet is now complete. We have finally reached the logical, New Critical conclusion that the Satyricon is an entirely self-contained literary game without any message whatsoever; in effect we are told that, like any serious piece of literature, the Satyricon ‘should not mean, but be’. Anderson is eager to disavow ‘the unproven conviction that every work must have a message, however diffusely or perversely expressed’.

Type
Research Article
Information
Ramus , Volume 16 , Issue 1-2 , 1987 , pp. 165 - 176
Copyright
Copyright © Aureal Publications 1987 

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References

1. Highet, Gilbert, ‘Petronius the Moralist’, TAPA 72 (1941) 176–94Google Scholar; Bacon, Helen, ‘The Sibyl in the Bottle’, Virginia Quarterly Review 34 (1958) 262–76Google Scholar; Arrowsmith, William, ‘Luxury and Death in the Satyricon ’, Arion 5 (1966) 304–31Google Scholar.

2. A key statement for the anti-moralist viewpoint is Walsh, P. G., ‘Was Petronius a Moralist?’ G & R 21 (1974) 181–91Google Scholar. He should be read in close connection with Wright, John, ‘Disintegrated Assurances: The Contemporary American Response to the Satyricon ’, G & R 23 (1976) 32–39Google Scholar. Wright is particularly perceptive in his analysis of the literary nature of responses to the Satyricon. As he points out, many contemporary readers first encounter the Satyricon in the epigraph to T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land and therefore may read Petronius through Eliot’s previous reading.

3. Sullivan, J. P., The Satyricon of Petronius: A Literary Study (London 1968) 255 Google Scholar. There have been many subsequent refinements of our view of Petronius’ narrative technique which have made him seem much less opportunistic. For example, in the final stages of preparing this paper there came to my attention Hubbard, T. K., ‘The Narrative Architecture of Petronius’ Satyricon’, AC 55 (1986) 190–212Google Scholar, which argues for an elaborate ring structure in Petronius. His case for ring composition in the Cena (elements of which have been noted before) is persuasive. While his attempt to extend this ring structure to the whole of the Satyricon may not persuade, it is clear that Petronius did not simply toss off episodes of his novel as nightly court entertainments without any overall plan.

4. Anderson, G., Eros Sophistes: Ancient Novelists at Play (Chico 1982) 95 Google Scholar, commenting on the work of Zeitlin, Froma, ‘Petronius as Paradox: Anarchy and Artistic Integrity’, TAPA 102 (1971) 631–684Google Scholar. See also p.67 where he states: ‘We can still choose between a Petronius who is reacting in some way against the vision of society he is portraying, and who wishes to convey this reaction to his readers; and a Petronius engaged in writing a work of literature, whose aim is neither higher nor lower than to produce literary entertainment.’ Implicit in this statement is the view that if Petronius is criticising his society, such criticism is not ‘literature’, and Anderson is quite sure that the Satyricon is literature in his sense.

5. E. Auerbach, Mimesis, trans. W. R. Trask (Princeton 1953) 30. See also Sullivan 98–106. The view of Arrowsmith (n.l above) 304 is: ‘In technique the Cena seems to be, and has always been regarded as, brilliant realism. But that realism is directed and supported by remarkable thematic concentration and symbolic economy.’

6. Sullivan (above, n.3) 160. See also 102f. where he discusses the influence of the concepts of mimesis and decorum on both Petronius’ artistic and literary aesthetics.

7. Pollitt, J. J., The Ancient View of Greek Art: Criticism, History, and Terminology (New Haven and London 1974) 11 Google Scholar.

8. Pollitt (above, n.7) 63.

9. A good introduction to the notion of these varying levels of readers or audiences is a recent issue of Arethusa (19.2 1986), Audience-oriented Criticism and the Classics, and in particular the essay by Peter J. Rabinowitz, ‘Shifting Stands, Shifting Standards: Reading, Interpretation, and Literary Judgement’ (115–134). While I differ considerably from Rabinowitz on some points (e.g., to what degree reading procedures are already encoded in texts and what other factors constrain a reader’s interpretations), he lays out the issues with admirable clarity. Much of satire and irony exploits these differences in audience level. For another example dealing with visual interpretation (though not of an art object such as we here consider), see my discussion of the pastry Priapus in ‘ Satyricon 60.9: Which Augustus?’ LCM 11 (1986) 43 Google Scholar.

10. Trimalchio’s most forthright declaration on the subject follows his triumphant display of mangled mythology, where he concludes (52.3): meum enim intellegere nulla pecunia vendo, ‘I wouldn’t sell my knowledge at any price’.

11. As costliness and miraculous qualities are interrelated in Trimalchio’s mind. At 50.7–51.6 Trimalchio tells the story of the man who invented an unbreakable and malleable form of glass but was executed by the emperor in order to suppress the discovery. Trimalchio introduces the story by saying he prefers glass dishes to metal; however, he does not use them because they are so cheap (vilia). If this miraculous glass existed, then aurum pro luto haberemus, ‘we should treat gold like dirt’ (51.6). Note the (far from logical) connections between price and value in Trimalchio’s mind. Though he prefers glass, he will not use it because the marketplace does not value it. If, however, this miraculous glass existed, it would dethrone the existing standard of value, gold, and take its place.

12. Pollitt (above, n.7) 63.

13. Except where noted, I use the text of Mueller, Konrad, Petronius: Satyrica, 3rd ed. (Munich 1983 Google Scholar).

14. Here I accept the emendation of Wehle which Heseltine prints in his Loeb text.

15. Arrowsmith (above, n.l) 311.

16. See Pollitt (above, n.7) 402–05.

17. He praises the figures of Apelles as giving one a picture of their very souls (83.2): tanta enim subtilitate extremitates imaginum erant ad similitudinem praecisae, ut crederes etiam animorum esse picturam, ‘for the edges of the figures were delineated according to the likeness with such subtlety that you would really have thought it a picture of their souls’.

18. Heliodorus Aethiopica 1.2.

19. See the brilliant exposition of the function of this scene in Imbert, C., ‘Stoic Logic and Alexandrian Poetics,’ in Doubt and Dogmatism: Studies in Hellenistic Epistemology, ed. Schofield, M., Burnyeat, M., and J. Barnes, (Oxford 1980 Google Scholar).

20. Most probably these are not in fact original paintings by Zeuxis and Apelles, any more than Trimalchio’s wine is really Opimian. Whether stolen originals or plausible copies, though, the motivation for the creation of such a collection is the same.

21. Encolpius confesses his inability to integrate all that he sees (30.1): non licebat multaciam considerare …, ‘it wasn’t possible to take in everything …’

22. Baldwin, Barry, ‘Hannibal at Troy: The Sources of Trimalchio’s Confusion’, Petronian Society Newsletter 17 (1987) 6 Google Scholar, has suggested that Petronius may be parodying the moralising history texts of Roman schoolboys in Trimalchio’s discussion of Corinthian bronze at 50.4–7. Certainly this is not technical art history, real or parodied.

23. See Pollitt (above, n.7) 327–34 for a history of the problem.

24. Vitruvius de Architectura 7.5.1–7; see Pollitt (above, n.7) 68–70.

25. Translation from Pollitt, J. J., The Art of Rome c. 753 B.C.-337 A.D.: Sources and Documents (Englewood Cliffs 1966) 128 Google Scholar.

26. Vitruvius 7.5.4: haec autem nec sunt nec fieri possunt nec fuerunt. Pollitt (above, n.7) neatly summarises this as a ‘rational theory of appropriateness’.

27. Sections 83f. and 88–90, the interruption being Eumolpus’ tale of the Pergamene Boy.

28. Eumolpus’ first aphorism is (83.9): amor ingenii neminem umquam divitem fecit, ‘love of wisdom never made anyone rich’.

29. 88.1: consulere prudentiorem coepi aetates tabularum et quaedam argumenta mihi obscura …, ‘I began to ask this wise man about the ages of the pictures and about some of the stories which were obscure to me …’

30. Sullivan (above, n.3). See also Anderson (above, n.4) 99ff.

31. P. G. Walsh, The Roman Novel (Cambridge 1970) 96 and n.3. The texts from Pliny are NH 34.37 and 34.58.

32. Of the many discussions I find most valuable Zeitlin, Froma, ‘Romanus Petronius: A Study of the Troiae Halosis and the Bellum Civile ’, Latomus 30 (1971) 56–82Google Scholar. See also Sullivan (above, n.3) 186–89.

33. Consider the judgement that Troy lost the favour of the gods by the profanation of their worship (89 vv.52f.): sic profanatis sacris / peritura Troia perdidit primum deos, ‘And thus, its rites profaned, doomed Troy first lost its gods’. The alliteration alone is enough to make this risible. Moreover, the story of the Pergamene Boy is in all probability itself sufficient to disqualify Eumolpus in Roman eyes as a teacher of morals.

34. Whether a specific parody of Seneca will necessarily be recognised by the reader is not the issue, though Sullivan (above, n.3) 187f. is persuasive in his case for parody of Seneca, I think. The metre alone places this in a theatrical context, more specifically that of tragic messenger speeches.

35. For Vergil’s technique in ekphmsis, see the discussion in Richard F. Thomas, ‘Vergil’s Ecphrastic Centerpieces’, HSCP 87 (1983) 175–184.

36. To my knowledge only Barnes, E. J., The Poems of Petronius (Diss. Toronto 1972) 71f Google Scholar. has tried to deal with this. Because he feels there is too much material for one or two paintings, he suggests Eumolpus is looking at a ‘Trojan cycle’ of four paintings. This stop-gap solution finds no support in the text. Petronius is deliberately emphasising the gap between Eumolpus’ poem as a text and its supposed referent, the painting.

37. For a lucid discussion, see Pollitt (above, n.7) 52–55 and the texts cited with discussion 293–97.

38. Imbert (above, n.19) 182.

39. Greenblatt, Stephen, Renaissance Self-Fashioning: From More to Shakespeare (Chicago and London 1980 Google Scholar).

40. My preliminary research on Petronius was done with the support of a fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies as a visiting fellow in the Department of Classics at Princeton University. I offer my sincere thanks to both.