Horace, Satires, Epistles, Roman festivals, freedom of speech, Fescinnines, insulting verses
<< previous
next >>
66
satire.
122
His stance is antagonistic and confrontational, and he appears ready both to attack and to defend his corner against all comers. In order to fashion their personas upon the models of their classical avatars these satirists must not only pay homage to their form, style and content, they are also dependant upon attracting hostile commentators upon their work with whom they might engage in exchanges of abuse.
The dialogic aspect of satire (especially that of the late-Elizabethan satirists) also seems to owe something to the festive influence of the Roman Saturnalia, as described by Horace (‘Satires’, II.vii. and ‘Epistles’, II.i.), combined with the viciousness of the Greek Fescennines from which they derived (these are also described by Horace, ‘Epistles’, II.i. ll.139-55). During such periods of holiday license at the Roman festivals freedom of speech was permitted and high offices were assumed by the lowborn. During the Fescinnines insulting verses are supposed to have been exchanged with such unrestrained savageness that they descended into violence and bloodshed, forcing the authorities to intervene and to impose libel laws. The satirists employ mutatis mutandis all these key elements of the ancient holidays, launching unrestrained invectives against vice, usurping the offices of beadle, schoolmaster, surgeon and even hangman in order to castigate the sinful and, most importantly for our purposes, engaging one another in hostile exchanges of insult. Such an interpretation of the influences upon late-Elizabethan satire goes a long way towards explaining away many of the reservations raised concerning satirists’ hypocritical
against detractors.
122 Satires of Persius: The Latin Text with a Verse Translation, trans. Guy Lee, ed. William Barr (Wolfeboro, NH and Liverpool: Cairns, 1987), p.14 (text), p.15 (trans.); Juvenal, ‘Satire One’, D.Ivnii Ivvenalis Saturae XIV: Fourteen Satires of Juvenal, ed. J. D. Duff (Cambridge: CUP, 1909), p.1 (text) and Juvenal: The Satires, trans. Niall Rudd, ed. William Barr (Oxford: OUP, 1992), p.3 (trans.).
<< previous
next >>
Stumble It!
