It is seven hundred and thirty-one years from the founding of Rome - the twenty-third year BC. In the house of Emperor Augustus on the Palatine Hill, the best poet of Rome - Virgil(70 - 19 BC) reads his “Aeneid” - a poem that he has been writing for six years and still does not consider complete. With difficulty Augustus persuaded him to read at least excerpts from it. His closest advisers sit next to Augustus. The rest of those present are poets and art lovers. Among them is Virgil's friend - a poet Horace(65 - 8 BC), a prematurely gray man. He recently published his "Odes" - three books lyric poems- and now enjoys fame. Next to him is the playwright Variy, also a friend of Virgil. Here and Tibullus(approx. 50 - 19
BC BC) - a young but already famous poet, author of tender love elegies, and Propertius(c. 50 - 15 BC) - a “learned lyricist” who once greeted the beginning of Virgil’s work on the Aeneid with enthusiastic verses:
Surrender, writers of Rome, surrender, poets of Hellas: Something greater is growing here in the Iliad itself!
(Translation by M. Gasparov.)
Virgil
Horace.
The audience listens with admiration and attention. For them, this is not just entertainment. It's about about the creation great literature, the creators of which the Romans could be no less proud of than the Greeks of Homer and Aeschylus. We are talking about creating literature worthy of the power of Rome - a world power in whose power the entire Mediterranean is in its power. Until now, the Romans had only the comedies of the cheerful Plautus, the poem of the great materialist thinker Lucretius “On the Nature of Things,” complete deep feeling lyric poems of the poet Catullus. But all these are just approaches to the creation of classical national Roman poetry, the flowering of which is associated with the names of Virgil and Horace.
Virgil and Horace witnessed how the republic perished in Rome and the empire was established in the person of Augustus. Horace himself once fought in the army of Brutus, last defender Roman freedom. Virgil and Horace joined Augustus because they wanted to see him as a continuer of republican traditions. Glorifying Augustus, they glorified the greatness of Rome in his person.
Virgil's poem "Aeneid" was recognized as the best classical work of Roman poetry. It is based on a myth once composed by the Romans that their ancestor - the Trojan Aeneas, the son of the goddess Venus - sailed to Italy after the fall of Troy. The Romans wanted to show that the history of their people was as ancient as the history of the Greeks.
The poem tells how the ships of Aeneas, having escaped from a terrible storm, land on the shores of Africa, where the Punic (the ancient Romans called the population of Carthage and other cities Punics) North Africa) Queen Dido builds her city of Carthage. Aeneas tells her about his fate: how Troy fell, how he escaped from the burning city and, with a few comrades, decided to find an unknown land, where, at the behest of the oracle, they should found a new city. Dido and Aeneas fell in love with each other. Having interrupted their journey, the Trojans spent long days and months in Carthage. But one day in a dream, the messenger of the gods, Mercury, appears to Aeneas.
He demands that Aeneas accomplish what was destined by fate: he founded a city, a new homeland for his descendants. Mournful Aeneas secretly leaves Dido and sails from Carthage. Unable to bear the separation, Dido pierces herself with a sword. And Aeneas continues his journey and finally reaches the shores of Italy. Here, in order to find out about his future fate, he descends into the terrible Avernus cave, where, according to legend, there was an entrance to kingdom of the dead. Before him pass majestic images of the future heroes of the Roman people. Inspired by these visions, Aeneas leads his companions to establish a settlement on this land. But Aeneas and his comrades had to endure a long war with local tribes before they founded the treasured city of Alba Longa. The kings of Alba Longa gave birth to Romulus, the founder of Rome, and the son of Aeneas Ascanius became the progenitor of the Roman Julius family, to which Emperor Augustus belongs. Thus, the glorification of Rome and Augustus, a reminder of the mythical past common to the Greeks and Romans, and the affirmation of the special greatness granted only to Rome in the present are inextricably intertwined in the poem.
Archaeologists, excavating the ancient cities of the Roman Empire, every now and then find fragments of walls with roughly inscribed lines from the Aeneid, apparently once loved ordinary people. And for Roman writers, “The Aeneid” forever remained an unsurpassed model. Many centuries later, many poets of the Renaissance and the era of classicism imitated this brilliant creation of Virgil in their poems.
Ovid
If Virgil created the classical Roman epic, then his friend and contemporary Horace created the classical Roman lyric poetry. He also praised the valor of his ancestors in his poems; however, he more readily recalled the ancient simplicity of morals, taught to enjoy the “golden mean” of modest income, wrote about the melancholy and joy of love, about cheerful parties with good friends. These poems were taken as a model by many poets of modern times, including Russian poets of the 18th - early XIX V. But Horace dedicated perhaps his best poems to the glorification of his calling - poetry. Among them is the famous “Monument”:
I erected a monument more eternal than durable copper
And royal buildings above the pyramids;
Neither the acrid rain nor midnight Aquilon,
Not a series of countless years will destroy.
(Translation by A. Fet.)
In Russian poetry, the theme of Horace’s “Monument” was heard in the wonderful poems of Derzhavin and Pushkin.
The work of Virgil and Horace paved the way for the third great poet of the Augustan era - Ovid(43 BC - c. 18 AD). His most significant work is the poem “Metamorphoses” (“Transformations”). Ovid collected almost all the myths “about transformations” (there were over two hundred of them) and retold them in his poem. The result is a collection of the most poetic examples of Greek and Roman mythology. Niobe turns to stone, having lost her children as punishment for her arrogance; the stupid King Midas grows donkey ears, etc.
Illustration by D. Bisti for Virgil's Aeneid.
Ovid's life was unhappy. He composed love elegies and mythological poems, caring little about glorifying Roman power and the imperial name. The aging Emperor Augustus did not like this. He exiled the poet to the outskirts of the empire, to the shores of the Black Sea, where the Romanian city of Constanta is now located. There Ovid died, after spending ten years in exile. In a foreign land, he created his last book - “Sad Elegies”. Many centuries later, Pushkin, exiled to Chisinau, lived not far from these places. He often turned his thoughts to the fate of Ovid - an exile like him. Pushkin called one of his southern poems “To Ovid.” And anyone who has read the poem “Gypsies” will never forget the wonderful words about the Roman poet put into the mouth of an old gypsy:
He was already years old,
But he is young and alive with a kind soul;
He had a wonderful gift of songs
And a voice like the sound of waters.
Lyric poetry originated in the 1st century. BC. in a circle of young poets, among whom Catullus was the most talented. He was the first to introduce into Latin poetry the use of various meters known in Greek poetry. The most famous are his lyrical poems dedicated to Lesbia, as he called Clodia, the sister of the popular tribune Clodius. Claudia was a typical representative of her time, when in upper classes The “morals of the ancestors” fell into complete decline and the old indestructible Roman family was replaced by easily and often dissolved marriages and equally easy connections. Claudia's love affairs were known throughout Rome. In the poems dedicated to her, Catullus amazing sincerity and with force he imprinted his passionate, although mixed with contempt, love, painful jealousy, the bitterness of breakups and the happiness of reconciliation. These verses became not only the basis further development Roman lyric poetry, but also its best examples.
Circus shows have been very popular in Rome since ancient times. In 254 BC. For the first time, gladiatorial games were organized, which from the middle of the 2nd century. BC. become a favorite pastime of the Romans. Very large sums are spent on organizing games and circus performances. The funds allocated by the state to the aediles and praetors for organizing the games were usually not enough, and the Romans who held these positions politicians, if only they strived for popularity, they did not hesitate to spend on them own funds, sometimes even getting into large debts.
Also popular among the general public short skits and farces, the so-called attelans and mimes, which grew out of purely Roman folk games. They were no strangers to political and social motives. Funny characters took part in them: rogues, gluttons, impudent people; simple craftsmen and peasants were brought onto the stage. At the end of the republic, the memes of the freedman Sir were especially popular, from which current sayings and witticisms were later extracted and collected.
Further development of Roman architecture and fine arts occurs in the 3rd - 1st centuries. BC. In cities, public buildings of a completely new architectural style are being built - basilicas; from the beginning of the 2nd century. BC. monumental decorative structures appear - triumphal arches.
A huge number of statues, which now decorate Roman squares, public and private buildings, were brought from conquered Greek cities to Rome as spoils of war. The Romans themselves created a new genre of sculpture, in the development of which they achieved great perfection - realistic sculptural portrait. It should also be noted the development of fresco paintings, which from the 2nd century. BC. are beginning to be used mainly for decorative purposes.
The population of Italy flocks to Rome in droves; in addition, many provincials now live there - these are mainly Greeks, Syrians, and Jews.
Magnificent buildings are being built in the city. The forum turns into a square decorated with temples, basilicas, porticoes, arches, and sculptures. Thus, Pompey built the first stone theater, Caesar built a beautiful new Forum, which later became a model for this type of structure.
100 RUR bonus for first order
Select job type Graduate work Coursework Abstract Master's thesis Report on practice Article Report Review Test Monograph Problem Solving Business Plan Answers to Questions Creative work Essay Drawing Compositions Translation Presentations Typing Other Increasing the uniqueness of the text PhD thesis Laboratory work Online help
Find out the price
The development of lyric poetry in Ancient Rome is closely connected with social processes, namely with the fall of the Roman Republic and the establishment of the Empire. In the middle of the 1st century. BC. a new one has appeared literary school – Neoterics. Her literary model was the heyday of Greek classical lyric poetry and Alexandrian poetry. The determining factor in the artistic worldview of the neoteric people was the rejection of the surrounding world, official society and interest in man in the world of his personal feelings and sensations. What was new in their poetry was that personal experiences rose to heights civil life. The poetry of personal feelings introduced a new hero into Roman literature and required the development of small genre forms and improvements poetic size. The works of neoteric poets have reached us only in scattered fragments or mentions. The only exception- collection of poems Guy Valery Catullus. It contains 116 poems. Small poems reminiscent of the lyrical works of modern times are a genre that was first developed in Rome in the work of Catullus. Catullus's poems are dedicated to various topics. There are appeals to friends, mocking poems, and love lyrics. His works always have addressees and are associated with specific events personal life poet. Special value is asserted human personality, and the hero of Catullus’s poetry appears as both a man and a citizen at the same time in equally. In this case, the affirmation of a new ideal comes through the negation of a previously existing one. Love in Catullus is presented from the same perspective, and for his heroes it means the merging of civic aspirations with the dictates of the heart, life for another person and in another. Catullus's love combines sensual joys and spiritual communication, tenderness and duty. In the lyrics of Catullus, for the first time, love appears as a great, powerful feeling that elevates a person. In this respect, Catullus's poems resemble best samples love lyrics new time.
Beauty, and above all female, - special topic works of Catullus. For the first time in Roman literature, the components of the ideal of beauty were “attractiveness,” “refinement,” and “grace.”
The only surviving table poem was translated by A. S. Pushkin. The poet left without translation one line of the poem, in which Postumia was compared to a drunken grape. This comparison seemed, apparently, difficult for the poet to translate.
Thus, in the work of Catullus, three greatest events for Roman literature take place: the appearance of a qualitatively new hero, combining man and citizen; knowledge and research privacy, life, relationships; opening complex world human feelings in their contradiction and unity. With the poetry of Catullus, all the meters of Greek lyric poetry entered Roman literature, many of which were used for the first time.
|
Octavian Augustus in the pose of Jupiter |
The further development of poetry in Rome was associated with the establishment of the power of Octavian Augustus and the proclamation of the Principate ( initial stage empire of the 1st century BC e. – I century n. e.) and the formation literary circles. Virgil, Horace, Ovid, Tibullus, Propertius and other poets shone in them.
Horace. The poet's first works were epodes - iambic poems written in couplets. These mocking poems, full of irony and sometimes deliberate rudeness, contrast sharply with the sensitivity of the bucolic works of Virgil and with Roman elegy. Horace, already in his first works, is the creator of original lyrics, which laid the foundation for satire and ode. During the 1930s, Horace published two collections of satires. He himself called his satires conversations (sermones), as if emphasizing that the main thing in them was the presentation of thoughts in the form of a relaxed dialogue. The poet strives to write his satires in an elegant, relaxed language, close to oral conversation educated person. He concentrates his attention on the problem of personal happiness, wanting to teach his readers life wisdom. The satires discuss various moral issues: the harm of ambition and ignorance, the stupidity of vanity, the futility of greed, the demand for leniency towards the shortcomings of a friend is put forward, the modest and moderate image life.
|
I erected a monument, it is stronger than copper, Higher than the proud pillar of the royal pyramids. Rain, sharpening granite, and Aquilona whirlwind They won't destroy it. Uncountable series Years will fly over it and centuries will pass by. No! Not all of me will die. The best part me He will avoid a funeral. My glory to bloom Will be forever until the Capitoline Temple The priest rises and with him the silent maiden. They will say I was born where Aufid 10 makes noise, Where once Davn 11 in the water-poor fields He ruled a rural country - a king from nothingness! I was the first to translate the Aeolian song In the Italian way. Be proud of me! With the solemn laurel, O Melpomene, to me You crown the head with well-deserved affection. |
At the age of 23, he released a collection of his lyrical poems, which are usually called odes. Horace follows ancient Greek poets- Alcaeus, Sappho, Anacreon. The Roman poet creates a kind of lyrical poetry in which thought prevails over feeling and artistic images are selected to illustrate certain provisions of the “Horatian wisdom”, known to us from his satires, but enriched here with motifs of ancient Greek lyric poetry. Horace considered it his merit that he was the first to convey in Latin verse many of the metric meters first developed by the ancient Greek poets. He writes about this in the famous ode to Melpomene, which inspired G.R. Derzhavin and A.S. Pushkin.
The odes vary in theme. Among them are love and friendship poems, hymns to the gods, and responses to political events. However, whatever the content of the poem, it always bears the stamp of a characteristic Horatian manner. Unlike Catullus's lyrics, which are poor in imagery but rich in emotional content, Horace's poetry shines with skillfully drawn pictures, refined thoughts, subtle irony and deep generalizations. At the same time, the author maintains the pose of an observer, recording the moods of the characters and giving his conclusions. The images and motifs of ancient Greek lyrics: a feast, the vicissitudes of love, a call for pleasure in the face of impending death and others - serve to create a stylized poetic world with somewhat conventional characters and feelings.
In 17 BC. In Rome, the festival of the “renewal of the century” was solemnly celebrated, which marked the end of civil wars and the beginning of a new, happy era. Horace was commissioned to compose a festive hymn. In this official hymn, the poet glorifies Octavian Augustus and his reforms, exalts the Roman state, and glorifies the beginning of a new century. The anthem is written in the solemn style of a cult song. At this time, Horace became a recognized poet, and Octavian Augustus insisted that he glorify his state activities in his poems.
In The Science of Poetry, Horace appears as a theorist of Roman classicism. The poet expresses his views in the form of a casual conversation, easily moving from one question to another, addressing practical advice to his readers, giving examples, peppering his speech with jokes and witticisms. Horace demands harmony and proportionality of parts from a poetic work, and calls for choosing an object that corresponds to the poet’s capabilities.
Horace's creative activity was of great importance for the history of Roman literature. However, his fame is ancient times could not compare with the popularity of Virgil. In the Middle Ages it was widely read. However, interest in him as a lyric poet took on wide dimensions only during the Renaissance. His poetry played a big role in the development of modern poetry. Certain provisions of the unique Horatian philosophy (the so-called “Horatian wisdom”) are often found in French lyric poetry of the 18th - early 19th centuries, and they also penetrate into Russian poetry. Horatian motifs are used by Lomonosov, Derzhavin, Delvig and Pushkin.
At the same time, when the poetic activity of Virgil and Horace unfolded, a unique genre of love elegy emerged and developed in Rome. Representatives of this genre were Gall, Tibullus, Propertius and Ovid. The central theme of their poetry is love. It is in the world of love experiences that they find the main content of life. The Roman elegiacs are critical of the principate. Propertius and Ovid ridicule the marriage laws issued by Octavian Augustus, express contempt for government activities and military service. Tibullus ignores political events, does not even mention the name of Octavian. In their elegies, these poets create a special world, opposed to the official world. They require respect and attention to feelings that have not yet played a central role in the work of Roman poets. They use motifs and images of ancient love poetry, modifying them and, as it were, passing them through the prism of the author’s perception. At the center of the elegy is the personality of the author himself, who always describes his own experiences and events in his life. The subjective nature of the Roman elegy distinguishes it from the narrative love elegy on mythological themes that was cultivated by ancient Greek and Hellenistic poets.
From Tibullah Several elegies have reached us that touch with the sincerity of feelings and the tenderness of the soul. He knows how to vividly convey the shades of love, draw pictures of nature, show life common man. Tibullus has great control over wealth Latin language, writes easily and gracefully. His poetry was highly valued even in ancient times.
Propertius left four books of elegies. He is a singer of passionate love, who sees in it the purpose of life. In the poet's elegies, Love is mournful and difficult, his mistress Kynthia is cruel and capricious. If the love of Tibullus is shown against the backdrop of an idyllic rural life, then Propertius paints various pictures: porticos, squares and streets of Rome, the fashionable resort of Bailly, Coast etc. The poet shows great interest in mythology and even plans to subsequently create a cycle of narrative elegies on mythological themes. Mythological images are very often found in his works. He constantly compares his beloved to beautiful heroines the distant past, their experiences and vicissitudes of difficult love with the feelings of mythological heroes. Mythology is a unique means of poeticization, to which he willingly resorts, revealing his “scholarship.” In the work of Propertius, the genre of Roman elegy seems to outgrow the narrow framework of love lyrics, enriching itself with a number of new themes.
Ovid was a gifted orator, although he did not like speeches that required strict logic and legal argumentation. Ovid was attracted to speeches in which it was possible to give psychological characteristics characters placed in some unusual position. Ovid's speech, according to Seneca, resembled prose poems (solutum carmen). Brilliant poetic talent and attraction to literary creativity manifested themselves very early in this outstanding poet.
Ovid's first literary work was a collection of love elegies. Based on the poetry of his predecessors, using traditional motifs of Roman elegiac poets, Ovid creates a new type of elegy, far from the romantically elevated elegy of his predecessors. Ovid stands firmly on the ground of reality, takes a keen interest in his surroundings, and is endowed with keen observation and wit. He seems worthy of poetic depiction of those aspects of life that were avoided by previous elegiac poets. He boldly takes his readers to the Roman circus, where during a performance young men meet girls.
The poet teaches a jealous spouse and gives advice to a lover on how best to deceive the husband of his beloved. Ovid makes fun of the marriage laws of Octavian Augustus, laughs at the rich and stupid praetor, who is successful with his Corinna. Everyday human feelings and pictures surrounding life become objects of image in Ovid's poetry. For the first time, jokes, laughter, and irony penetrate so widely into Roman lyric poetry with his elegies, defining the basic tone of the young poet’s love poems.
A representative of the younger generation of the Principate period, which did not go through the fire of civil wars, Ovid readily accepts the benefits of peace and culture that characterize initial period Roman Empire. The painful struggle and search are alien to him. life position, which were characteristic of poets of the previous generation. Ovid's attention is drawn to inner world person. However, he doesn't build complex system the relationship of a person with the surrounding reality, as did the poets of the previous period (Virgil and Horace). But in the traditional genre of love elegy this new approach Ovid's approach to his heroes was not fully realized. Having lost the main thing - a deeply serious attitude towards its topic, Ovid's elegy turned into a witty joke, an elegant lyrical miniature. Everyday reality, everyday life in this genre could, naturally, find only an ironic, playful embodiment. From love elegies the poet moves on to the genre of lyrical messages on mythological themes. "Heroines" (or "Messages from Heroines")- these are poetic letters from the heroines of the myth to their husbands and lovers who left them. The messages are addressed by Penelope, Briseis, Dejanira, Medea, Phaedra, Ariadne, Dido and others. Drawing images that are widely known to the Roman reader and have a centuries-old tradition in ancient fiction, Ovid brings new light to spiritual life their characters. The messages are reminiscent of rhetorical svasoria, speeches put into the mouths of historical or mythological characters, which were pronounced in rhetorical schools. Ovid's heroines master all the tricks oratory, combining in his letters rhetorical figures with lyrical outpourings. The messages are monotonous in theme, since all the heroines are in the same position - separated from their lovers. The same motives are found in letters from different heroines (complaints about loneliness, jealous suspicions, memories of the past, a request for a return, etc.). The poet's art is manifested in the ability to vary similar motifs, in the desire to give each image unique features that distinguish it from others. At the same time, Ovid, as it were, takes his characters off mythological pedestals, bringing them closer to the everyday appearance of contemporary Roman women. To do this, he introduces a number of strokes and precise details into the messages, indicating the poet’s deep interest in the life around him.
The first period of Ovid's work ends with two humorously didactic poems: "The Art of Love" (Ars amatoria) and "Remedies for Love" (Remedia amoris), 1 BC - 1 AD The poem "The Art of Love" is one of the most brilliant works of the young Ovid in terms of wit and formal perfection. The poet parodies in it scientific manuals, in particular manuals on rhetoric. It amounts to whole codex rules of behavior that should guide a young man in love in his relationship with his beloved woman. Ovid begins his humorous poem with the section: “Finding the Object of Love,” giving advice on how and where to find a suitable lover. The second part of the poem is devoted to how to win love, the third how to keep it. The work contains numerous everyday sketches, elegant mythological stories, and humorous discussions on moral topics.
The poem caused dissatisfaction with the guardians of morality due to the freeness of tone and the outright boldness of individual paintings. Then Ovid composed another work on the exact opposite topic - “Remedies for Love.” In this short work, he advises to engage agriculture or government activities, go on a long journey, etc., in order to heal from the feeling of love. The poem is also humorous and full of wit.
During the heyday of his poetic talent, Ovid began to create large works on mythological themes. He simultaneously writes two poems: "Metamorphoses" and "Fasts". "Metamorphoses"" - an epic poem that tells legends about the transformation of people into animals, as well as into objects of inanimate nature: plants and stones, springs, luminaries, etc. These myths are widespread in folklore various peoples. The Roman poet used numerous sources: scientific and artistic works, catalogs and works of fine art. The poem consists of 15 books. This is a fascinating, vividly written work with a lot of characters, with a constant change of scene. Ovid collected about 250 myths about transformations. Scattered myths with various heroes are united here into a single whole. To give unity to the work, the poet uses various techniques: he unites myths according to cycles (Theban, Argive, etc.), according to the similarity of characters, according to the place of action. Often comes up with connecting links between different legends. The combination of fantasy and reality is characteristic of Ovid's entire poem. His heroes, on the one hand, are fabulous mythological figures, on the other, ordinary people. The narrative is not complicated by any thoughtful reasoning. This accessibility, lightness and poetry of the story ensured Ovid's poem wide popularity in ancient and modern times. The reader of modern times usually became acquainted with ancient mythology in Ovid’s fascinating presentation through this widely known and beloved poem already in the Middle Ages. Many stories provided material for numerous literary works, operas, ballets and paintings.
Simultaneously with "Metamorphoses" Ovid wrote another poem, " Fasty"(Calendar). The poem "Fasti", written in elegiac distich, tells the origin of certain Roman rites, festivals and ceremonies. Here there is a slightly different style of narration (although a lot of space is also devoted to mythology), there are more everyday details, and the very tone of the narration is simpler, more lyrical and emotionally richer than in “Metamorphoses”.
Ovid dedicated his poem to Octavian Augustus and devoted Special attention it contains festivities associated with the imperial house. Completely unexpected for him was Octavian’s menacing order to expel him from Rome to the Black Sea coast to the city of Tomy (near present-day Constanta in Romania) in 8 AD. Ovid complains in his “Sorrowful Elegies” about the difficult living conditions in these places, about the lack of books, about the illnesses debilitating him. In exile he wrote 5 books "Sorrowful Elegies"", 4 books" Messages from Pontus". Only poetry brightens the life of an exile.
Ovid was proud of the works he created and more than once emphasized in his “Sorrowful Elegies” that they would live for centuries and be read by all peoples. Indeed, he was one of the most popular poets of Rome in the Middle Ages and in modern times. "The Art of Love" inspired many medieval and Renaissance poets. "Metamorphoses" has become an inexhaustible treasury of mythological legends for many generations. Ovid is deeply original, his creations sparkle with poetic invention and at the same time are full of interest in life, which he knew how to depict generously and colorfully. The works of this greatest artist of Ancient Rome have not lost their significance even today.
At the beginning of our era lyric poetry is not popular; the works are dominated by practical morality, propaganda of philosophical ideas, and the desire to bring rhythmic prose closer to rhythmic poetry. Epigrams (Martial) and satires (Juvenal) are most popular among poets. Martial known for the epigrams that he dedicated to depicting reality, ridiculing the vicious phenomena of everyday life. He largely followed Catullus in using his measurements. Satires Juvenal initially had a sharply accusatory character, criticizing the licentiousness and depravity of the morals of the empire. The author focused on the degeneration of once noble families, the moral decline of the family, the limitless power of money, the dissipation of some and the miserable life of others. Later, Juvenal is no longer so critical, but evaluates life in a calmer tone; the tone of the later satires is conciliatory.
Thus, the achievements of the poets of Ancient Greece and Rome laid the foundation for the development of European lyrical creativity.
Writing letters in a column does not tolerate illiteracy. Only when the gopniks from Rome learned first to read, and then in Greek, only then did they themselves have poetry - no earlier than the 1st century BC. Moreover, the matter was aggravated by the fact that, unlike normal people, the Romans did not even have a folk-epic tradition - because the city of renegades, thieves and bandits was not a people, having stolen the language from the Latins, beliefs from the Etruscans, science and art from the Greeks.
Top 10 poets of Ancient Rome in chronological order
1. Guy Valery Catullus. The oldest of the serious Latin poets and still the most talented. The poetry of Catullus is characterized by something that all other Roman authors do not have - passion, overwhelming emotions, brightness and richness of images and experiences. Whatever he writes about - about his beloved bitch Lesbia, about a friend’s wedding, about political intrigues and machinations, about adherents of Eastern cults, Catullus does not stop himself with “graceful cutting,” “venerable moderation,” or “arguments of reason.” If he loves, then to death, if he hates, to death, if he laughs, sarcastically. Some call it “golden youth” and frown, but as Guy Valery himself noted, it is not necessary to be the same in life as in your poems...
2. Publius Virgil Maro. Nicknamed the “Swan of Mantua,” Virgil would have been much more deserving of the nickname “The Wise Minnow.” Do not look for suffering and genuine experiences in his poems - he “like a diligent boy” follows Theognis in “Bucolics” (which laid the foundation for the disgusting tradition European poetry describe the sweetly glamorous fictional life of shepherdesses and shepherdesses), Hesiod in the Georgics (a “spiritually strong” glorification of “physical labor in the lap of nature” in defiance of the “liberal atheism of the concrete jungle”), and Homer in the Aeneid (an overgrown state order that the people of Rome were not born from a bunch of bandit rednecks from the region, but descended from the heroic Trojans). Although while most people shed tears of emotion at the “platitudes in a column”, which they mistakenly call poetry, Virgil will remain popular.
3. Quintus Horace Flaccus. You all know these people who have a reputation for being “wise in life” - “in the middle”, who firmly know that in grief you should not bang your head on the table (it will hurt), and in joy you should not drink an extra glass (your belly will ache). They turned the "golden mean" into the only life principle. And therefore, Horace’s satires belong to the category “We, comrades, need kinder Shchedrins...”, and his other works belong to the genre of “Songs of a wise and calm villager”, who never forgets that in the end it is necessary to have dinner on time - and goodness ... And there seems to be nothing to reproach them for, but these poems bear distinct traces of pumice, which was used to rub the parchment in order to achieve the “golden mean.”
4. Sextus Aurelius Propertius. If we understand the word “lyrics” in a preachy, narrow way as “poems about love,” then Propertius is one of the most subtle and “lyrical” lyricists. Almost all the books of his “Elegies” are devoted to endless worries about the one and only (the poet was a pronounced monogamist) Cinthia, who first pleases the author with her passion and caresses, and then upsets him (according to the classical scheme - “vinegar makes you sad, mustard makes you sad”) ") with his frivolity and betrayal. And like a real introvert, most of storms and hurricanes happen inside" spiritual world"of the poet himself, without breaking out. All the nonsense and endless throwings of a fevered imagination are present. In general, "whoever has truly loved himself will understand" ...
5. Publius Ovid Naso. For people who are not very knowledgeable (and in need) of poetry, a poet must lead a “special poetic life” so that it is clear that he is a poet (otherwise every fool can write poetry, and go figure out who has the real ones). You have to drink, carouse, debauch, sleep with a princess, be caught, flogged and exiled to the crests of the asses of the world, where you moan and complain about horror, darkness and despair... So from generation to generation people do not read Ovid's poems (except perhaps " Science of love" for the eternal reason - to convince themselves that they have sex not for the needs of the body, but "for highly aesthetic purposes"), being content with his biography - neither "Fasta" with "Metamorphoses" (an extensive source of information about the mythology of the Greeks and Romans ), nor " Sorrowful Elegies", not even a fragment of a poem with descriptions of fish in the Black Sea.
6. Albius Tibullus. About banalities in a column has already been written above - and therefore there is a “special order” for “the simple experiences of a simple man about ordinary women", and even "without this abstruse showing off of yours with all sorts of mythological Greeks" is eternal. So Tibullus's "everyday stories" about love for the beautiful Delia, who "at first did not give him - horror, then she gave him happiness, and then she gave him grief !", about the consolation of this love with... hmm-hmm... the boy Marat, and then new passion to the hetaera Nemesis, who “doesn’t understand your stupidity, but mostly cash” - these “works of art” will remain popular for a long time, because even very learned philologists are not alien to “everything human”...
7. Mark Valery Martial. You don't know how to be subtle lyricist- burn with a verb. Fate gave him a harmful, bilious and angry character, with the ability to notice in people everything that is most unworthy of humanity - go into satirism. “Satire bravely fights for humanism and the cause of peace” - Martial could have made these sublime words an epigraph to a collection of his epigrams, if he had not been driven by a simple craving for ridicule, gossip and ridicule of others. Well, to paraphrase famous saying, even if the person is not the best, as long as the poems are not bad. And the poems “they themselves” are a centuries-old object of imitation and envy of all those trying to become famous as great epigrammatists.
8. Aulus Persius Flaccus. I don’t know where this eternal complaint comes from against writers, and even funnier, against poets, that they “don’t reflect the reality of life.” My dears, life is best reflected by a puddle in the yard, but no one will advise you to drink from it. The tasks of a work of art are slightly different from those of a mirror. Therefore, the reproaches that Persius, who died young and shy, “did not know life,” and that is why his “images are pale and do not reach Horace’s” are quite absurd. It’s rather fitting to be surprised that such a young and green man chose satire (not the easiest genre for young men, as well as not the most obvious), and was also able to write poetry in such a way that they are still being published... And they’re not that kind “sluggish” - rather, on the contrary, Persia is gloomy, pessimistic and gloomy for real, without the Horacean exaggerated optimism of the “golden mean”...
9. Mark Annaeus Lucan. What could be more vulgar than a poet writing an epic poem? Unless he's a poet writing a bad epic poem. But Lucan wrote a good “Pharsalia”, and most importantly, he dedicated it not to stories from Homer covered with moss and cracks (like Virgil or Statius), but to events that were still vividly remembered - civil war the bitch communists with the bitch white guards of Caesar and Pompey. Moreover, he did not “play the gold,” pretending to be the virgin “objective scribe” - Lucan’s sympathies are on the side of the losing Republicans (he himself will eventually be devoured by the “moloch of Stalin’s Nero repressions”). Some “literary scholars” in Rome itself did not like this, and they called Lucan “more of an orator than a poet.” But Martial answered like this: first, make sure people read it and they like it...
10. Juvenal. If Horace is angered or bothered by the “vicissitudes of fate” - in general, if the philistine who is peacefully hovering in the depths of the “golden mean” is still taken out by the gills and “obstructed”, his disadvantaged “ best feelings"can find a way out in a stream of malicious sarcasm. Juvenal honestly wanted to be a correct and highly moral person - but "injustice unjust world“forced him to “not be able to remain silent,” and he attacked with all the force of his poetic gift what he sincerely considered “not befitting a well-mannered person.” It is clear that the “heap” was dealt with not only by those who did evil, but also by those who (as has always been the case) who didn’t want to “be like everyone else.” But that’s the kind of thing it is - satire, it doesn’t choose who to nail and who to pardon...