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The Golden Ass
The Golden Ass - M. R. 2013
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Discussion - Week Three - The Golden Ass - Books 9 - 11
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The appearance of Isis was abrupt narratively but logically sound keeping in mind the reference to the 'Egyptian Book' & pen from the Nile in the prologue.I'd say that the religious vision was magical!
Religion has that wonderous quality that gives it somewhat magical aspect- remember the plays performed for the laity were called the 'miracle and morality plays'!
If I remember correctly,the corresponding dreams in Book 11 were engineered by divine machinery so it was definately not a coincidence.
How to define magic? I wouldn't even try- it'll be like dissecting a butterfly's wings or analyzing a rainbow. I'll leave the defining part to you.Do embellish it with your artistic sensibilities.
And lastly,realism was there but more often than not it slided into melodrama & farce-the various tragic instances in the book,esp. the story of Charite & her husband,stretched credulity.
Still I'd say that all in all,it was an engrossing read.
On the magical side of things, I will agree with Mala in that The Golden Ass "slided into the melodrama and farce." In that, the book uses the magic to magnify the farce and melodrama.Comments on the writing and subject matter: Thanks Jim for bringing this book to my attention; I had never heard of it. I really enjoyed the Graves translation for its smoothness and ease of reading.
The content is shocking, not because it is ancient Roman porn, which it is, but the fact that it survived the Middle Ages and Christendom. The city of Pompeii's pornographic art survived only because volcanic ash settled on top of it for millennia, but how does porn survive on a scroll in monasteries? Was The Golden Ass the go to scroll for a monk wanting to get off whilst fulfilling his copying duties? To me the survival of this book is so intriguing and the most "magical" aspect of it all.
Mod
"Brother Maynard! What dost thou in the loo? Abuse thyself not, sayeth the lord. Brother Maynard! Brother Maynard, save your soul!!"
I suspect that pornography, or what we perceive as pornographic is a protestant idea and part of their effort to vilify the Roman church. Sex, per se, wasn't "dirty" before the 17th century.
Also, as Mala mentions above, the religious elements and visions would have a place as theological points to ponder, and so would be valued by monks at that level.
No idea about porn- ancient or modern so can't comment on it but Ryan did bring out an interesting point- indeed how did it survive?To give parallel from Indian lit,Kamasutra was written sometime between 3rd to 6th century- you can imagine how open a culture must have been to examine sex in such details.
Again,in the architecture of the Khajuraho temples in India,built during the 9th century,erotic art was considered sacred enough to be carved on the temple walls! Sex was seen as a way to a higher consciousness as Osho later explored it in his book From Sex to Superconsciousness.
Thus it seems that ancient times were far more open & tolerant in this regard. Two hundred plus years of Moghal rule sure changed the free flowing culture of India!
I think Nathan N.R. Is best suited to answer Ryan's query as his interests straddle both religion & porn in equal measure.
A critical review from webring.org mentions:"It is probable that Apuleius met with Christians and Christian-missionary texts whilst in Rome, one such apology by Marcianus Aristides is a nasty attack on Isiac religion (Isis-worship). And then, his return to Carthage co-incided with the burst of Christianity in North Africa--Madauros, his own birthplace, being one of the centre of Christian witness (Turtullian's reports are that all of Roman North Africa was in turmoil in the 190s due to the spread of Christianity).
Thus, the Golden Ass--and Apuleius's rendering of the 'Cupid & Psyche' myth in particular--may be partially contrived as counter-doctrines to those of Christianity which Apuleius saw as threatening both the Isiac religion and Platonic philosophy. Thus his emphasis on the numen unicum multiformi specie (Apuleius XI.5), or 'single godhead with manifold forms' of Isis.
In the middle ages, the Inquisition, not surprising, attempted to destroy all known editions of Apuleius's work due to its jabs at Christianity and Christians, such as the portrayal of the baker's wife, one of the wickest characters in the novel:
'Tunc spretis atque calcatis divinis numinibus in viceram certae religionis mentita sacrilega praesumptione dei, quem praedicaret unicum, confictis observationibus vacuis fallens omnis homines et miserum maritum decipiens matutino mero et continuo corpus manciparat' (Apuleius IX.14) ['She scorned and spurned the gods of heaven; and in the place of true religion she professed some fantastic blasphemous creed of a God whom she named the One and Only God. But she used her deluded and ridiculuous observances chiefly to deceive the onlooker and to diddle her wretched husband; for she spent the morning in boozing, and leased out her body in perpetual prostitution' (Lindsay trans. 276) "
Ryan wrote: " but the fact that it survived the Middle Ages and Christendom."I don't know much at all about the transmission history of Apuleius's books. But I would suggest, along with Jim, that the history of prudery in regard to all things of the body, is a rather jumbled history. I like to suggest, too, that the middle ages and the reign of the church in europe was not as totalitarian as the popular imagination often believes, but was rather as diverse as europe is today, both in terms of culture and religion as well as in terms of national powers contending with one another. The history of europe always found the roman catholic church in conflict with this or that other power or culture.
But as to Apuleius particularly, he was not only the writer of a great novel, but a platonic philosopher as well, one with whom Augustine and other church fathers had their polemical engagements. In so far as the church fathers had been concerned to dispute with him, his books would have maintained a certain value. To grab a sentence from this abstract https://sites.google.com/site/apuleiu... , "the oldest surviving manuscript of these works, was probably transcribed ... as part of a campaign by the monks in the eleventh century to acquire and renew manuscripts of works associated with Augustine."
Also, I've noticed that writers from previous centuries tended to read Apuleius rather differently than we novel readers of today read him. In hearing Robert Burton quote him in his Anatomy of Melancholy (1621), it sounds almost as if he had read a different book altogether than the one I had read. So why did his book survive? It's almost as if it's a different book which survived through the centuries than the one we read today.
Also, as Mala points out, the Cupid Psyche story was important to religious thought through the centuries. Many churchmen turned it into an allegory for their own purposes, and most recently, CS Lewis' Till We Have Faces.
[but I've probably not addressed the porn question. I suspect porn didn't exist at the time. there would have been things like lasciviousness and bawd, but probably not porn. but I'm likely wrong about that]
@Nathan N.R.: Somebody just sprinkled gold dust here! Thanks.
Nathan "N.R." wrote: "Ryan wrote: " but the fact that it survived the Middle Ages and Christendom."I don't know much at all about the transmission history of Apuleius's books. But I would suggest, along with Jim, tha..."
Ok! I understand better with which context to take this book. Thanks for the enlightening response.
Book 9 – That Lucius do get around. Passed from master to master with many narrow escapes, Lucius uses his long ears to hear and recount many sordid tales of lust and treachery.
Book 10 – A wicked cougar stepmother makes a play for her stepson and accidentally poisons her own son. Lucius lands a sweet gig as a gorging, dancing, boon companion. Re-cast as a “stud for hire”, Lucius makes his final escape.
Book 11 – Free at last, Lucius appeals to all the gods and goddesses for deliverance from his beastly form. Moved by his plea, Isis appears to him and instructs him in his liberation. True to her word, Lucius is returned to human form and devotes himself to the Goddess Isis. After three initiations, Lucius the man finds himself triply blessed.
And so we finish our first “magic realism” book for the year. The sorcery which turned Lucius into an ass is the primary magical element in the book. Would you also consider the appearance of Isis as a magical event? A religious vision?
What about Lucius’ dreams in Book 11 and their correspondence with the dream visions of the temple priest? Is that magic or coincidence? In general, what could we use as a general definition of “magic”?
On the realism side, when characters make narrow escapes, or when writers include lucky coincidences and the occasional deus ex machina, we usually accept these events as normal fictional devices, and so “realistic”. Beyond the metamorphosis of Lucius, was this an essentially realistic story?