from PARENTIBUS OPTIMIS
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2014
It was common practice for the Roman satirist to give an account of his genre, arraigning public vice, perhaps ridiculing the insufficiencies of the other literary forms, and informing the reader of the tone which he himself intended to adopt. The vehicle for this account was the programmatic satire. It is quite clear that Horace Satires II. I, Persius I, and Juvenal I are related compositions. Their shared features have been duly discussed in the secondary literature. Noting that a scholiast entitles Juvenal's first satire cur satiras scribat, also the corresponding formal characteristics of the three programmes, L. R. Shero concludes: ‘Each of the satires is constructed upon a traditional framework; and we may reasonably conclude that a satire of this type, ostensibly justifying the writing of satire by means of conventional devices and stock arguments, came to be looked upon as an indispensable feature of the satirist's stock-in-trade.’ More recently, E. J. Kenney has detected the following ‘pattern of apology’: ‘First, a pronouncement, lofty to the point of bombast, of the satirist's high purpose and mission. Second, a warning by a friend or the poet's alter ego or the voice of prudence – call it what you will. Third, an appeal by the satirist to the great example of Lucilius. Fourth, a renewed warning. Fifth and last, evasion, retraction and equivocation.’ But similarities apart, there is a marked degree of divergence in procedure. It is this – innovation within convention – which will occupy my attention.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.