Satires and Epistles

by Horatius, Jacob Fuchs

Horace is perhaps best remembered as the lyric poet of the Odes , and consequently as the inventor of the form named the Horatian Ode after him. But his achievement is more various than the Odes and Epodes suggest. Early in his life, and again in maturity, Horace sought to turn his poetic skills to the uses of moral and aesthetic discussion in the series of didactic works translated here. In the Satires , Horace adopts one persona after another, each of which reduces himself to absurdity in the process of trying to argue a point of view about the ethical or artistic life. The form of the Epistles permits Horace to write with particular intimacy, addressing moral issues in a persuasive yet informal way. The third epistle, The Art of Poetry , on the other hand, is a formal poem addressed to the emperor Augustus, and seeks to educate the poetic taste of the ruler of the western world. Jacob Fuchs is Associate Professor of English at California State University, Hayward. He is the editor of The Aeneid (Pengiun Classics, 1991), and author of Reading Horace (Edinburgh UP, 1967), The Imagery and Poetry of Lucretius (Edinburgh UP, 1969, reprint Bristol CP, 1994).

Genres: Poetry, Classics, Nonfiction, Satire, Roman History, Roman, Ancient

128 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 15

About the author

Odes and Satires Roman lyric poet Quintus Horatius Flaccus exerted a major influence on English poetry.

(December 8, 65 BC – November 27, 8 BC)

Horace, the son of a freed slave, who owned a small farm, later moved to Rome to work as a coactor, a middleman between buyers and sellers at auctions, receiving 1% of the purchase price for his services. The father ably spent considerable money on education of his son, accompanied him first to Rome for his primary education, and then sent him to Athens to study Greek and philosophy.

After the assassination of Julius Caesar, Horace joined the army, serving under the generalship of Brutus. He fought as a staff officer (tribunus militum) in the battle of Philippi. Alluding to famous literary models, he later claimed to throw away his shield and to flee for his salvation. When people declared an amnesty for those who fought against the victorious Octavian Augustus, Horace returned to Italy, only to find his estate confiscated and his father likely then dead. Horace claims that circumstances reduced him to poverty.

Nevertheless, he meaningfully gained a profitable lifetime appointment as a scriba quaestorius, an official of the Treasury; this appointment allowed him to practice his poetic art.

Horace was a member of a literary circle that included Virgil and Lucius Varius Rufus, who introduced him to Maecenas, friend and confidant of Augustus. Maecenas became his patron and close friend and presented Horace with an estate near Tibur in the Sabine Hills (contemporary Tivoli). A few months after the death of Maecenas, Horace died in Rome. Upon his death bed, Horace with no heirs relinquished his farm to Augustus, his friend and the emperor, for imperial needs, and it stands today as a spot of pilgrimage for his admirers.

Reviews

[David Lentz]

I wanted to travel back to the ancient roots of satire to see what I could learn. Horace is adept at finding paradox, which is at the heart of satire. He finds so many paradoxes in the city or "polis" that the politics of Rome drive him into the country where he seeks peace and can "lie in bed four hours after dawn." In Satire 1.1 he writes, "And so it happens that we can seldom find a man who claims to have lived a happy life, who quits life in contentment when his time is up, like a guest who has dined well." He is a fan of the Epicurean lifestyle and forsakes the city for his citadel in the mountains on a farm and takes his delight in it there. The quips and one-liners are hilarious and poignant as a satirist becomes expert at self-defense to preserve himself from the power of those whom he satirizes. Someone asked Horace if he was free from faults to which he replied, "Well, no, but they are different ones and perhaps not as great." He said that he understood his many flaws but that "I'm forgiving myself." He claims that his pen will never attack any living soul without provocation and like a sword in a scabbard will keep him safe. "Let me be brief: whether a peaceful old age awaits me or Death flits around me with her black wings, rich or poor, at Rome or in exile, should chance so determine, whatever hue my life takes on, I will be a writer." He encourages his readers to live on with courage in their hearts and stand up to fate's buffetings. He advises not "to torture yourself with a false sense of shame, since you're afraid to be thought mad among madmen." The Stoic bolsters his spirits laughably by saying, "For in my own mind I am sane" and then: "O greater madman, please spare a lesser one." As a Roman he gives the gods their due and the role that random chance plays in determining the outcome of life: "Alas, Fortune, what god shows us more cruelty than you? How you always enjoy making sport of men's affairs!" And when Fortune does precisely that, Horace seems ready with his pen to carve it up deliciously into immortal satire. I enjoyed his letters, too. Some great quotes here: "The beginning of virtue is the avoidance of vice; and the beginning of wisdom to have got rid of folly." And this:"Pleasure does harm when the cost is pain." Or this: "Anger is short-lived madness: rule your passion for it does not obey you, it gives you commands: restrain it with a bridle, restrain it, I tell you, with chains." And then this: "I pursue what has done me harm and shun what I believe will do me good." But the Epistle of highest interest to me and the reason for my reading this book is the "Ars Poetica" or "Art of Poetry." Here my ambitions to go back to the roots of poetry were rewarded in spades. "It is not enough for poems to be beautiful: they must be affecting and lead the listener's soul wherever they wish." He has good advice concerning what action to be played out offstage in poetic drama. He encourages the poet to use common or "garden words" in order to "entreat the gods that fortune might return to the wretched and leave the arrogant." He ends this Epistle writing about a poet whose head is so far up into the air that he falls into a well and despite calling out for help fails to raise interest among his fellows to pull him up. In fact, Horace would ask any rescuer with a rope attempting to save a poet from falling into a well, "How do you know he didn't throw himself into the well deliberately and has no wish to be saved." He cites a Sicilian poet who sought a famous end by throwing himself into the "hot glow of Etna." Thus, the satirist finds the finest satire within his own folly and why not: are we not the only ones we spend our only, precious, entire lifetime to come to know?

[Marc Lamot]

No satirical poems, but a kind of potpourri. For me the nicest ones are: No. 6: nice self-perception with an emphasis on truthfulness, despite modest origins, and proud of his small fortune that does not impose any duties on him; no. 9: very sharply written piece about a troublesome man who accuses Horace on the street and keeps on stalking him.

[Carly Philpott]

what a verbose guy

[Nancy]

Finished: 02.12.2018
Genre: poems
Rating: B
#CCBokReviews
Conclusion:

Horace’s satires…
These are very short poems
….easy on the eye
…and they enrich the mind!


My Thoughts

[Robert Brucato]

This was a tough slog. Too many references I had to check.

[Milo]

An earthen pot wherein Horace argues largely with himself; the Epicurean man at his wits' end; he who loves the city and the country but knows in either he will long for the other. That is, I would say, at the lowest chasm, the essence of Horace. Neither here nor there – and the perfect aspect of neither hereness nor thereness. He identifies this classic dichotomy – with regards to all action – and in centrist irony declares that situation to be some kind of ideal. We do exist in the space between; far better a space than the extremes either side. The comedy of these works cannot be expected to survive in full, and much of Horace’s musings on what is or is not decorous at a Roman dinner table is completely obscure to most reasonable people. (Are classicists reasonable people? A question for another goodreads review.) I should think it equivalent to a gag about the milk going in before the cereal in a universe that no longer indulges in such a dish. I’m sure the gag could be explained, and I’m sure these future men-without-cereal could write extensive notes explaining why the gag is, indeed, a gag. But this is not every satire nor is it every epistle; much of what Horace pontificates on remains amusing and remains precious. Especially his own inconsistency; that lingering sense that Horace cannot quite commit to his moralisms in the knowledge of his own contradicting them. I see in Virgil an Epicurean constancy – in Horace I see a man always leading a legion on the wrong side of battle, and finding that fact spectacularly funny. My translation was in prose, which – for once – might well be the ideal approach to what are often clerical parodies on Roman proclivities or, toward the last epistles, long asides on what constitutes good art. For whatever irrelevancies might slip into these collected works style publications, I can forgive them of Horace. He seems a man close to my soul. He would also, to all discredit, have voted for Blair. But then, who didn’t?

[S Moss]

Horace skips around to different, unexpected topics, sometimes coming close to real political events, at others being fairly bucolic and general in his comments. The parodies of contemporary behavior are still recognizable, as is his longing for the quiet of his Sabine farm where he could escape the strain of life in Rome. It helps to know a little about Horace's complex life, how he supported Brutus and thus was on the wrong side when Brutus was defeated. But through talent and luck he gained Virgil as mentor and Maecenas as wealthy patron. The satires give some background that useful if you go on to the more complex and less explanatory Odes, which it is worth doing.

[aj]

Horace, you little people pleaser

[Aj]

Horace, you little people pleaser

[Mehmed]

Weirdly I found the epistles more amusing than the satires

[Tanishq Khandelwal]

I like how past events are narrated in this manner. It shows that no matter how generations change, these kinds of things continue to happen because, in the end, we are only human

[Colin Williams]

I am reading this because I finished Ovid's Amores <1> and wanted more Latin poetry. Sadly, while Horace and Bovie (the translator) have their moments, this volume is to the Amores what Pericles, Prince of Tyre is to The Tempest.

[Matt Morris]

Actually I read the Jacob Fuchs translation, which I couldn't find on Goodreads. If you'd like to read my review of it & other books, please visit me at http://miscmss.blogspot.com/2013/03/s...

[Donna]

It's surprising how modern (and vulgar) these ancient Romans are. But the type was too small in this edition for me to truly enjoy reading it.

[Josh Goldman]

The satires are a turbid, thick web of arcane references and little enjoyment to me; that’s no fault of hard work of scholarship and translation in this edition.