XMind

Augustuan Poets

1. Virgil

   1. Dates

      1. Born: 70 BCE

      2. Death: 19 BCE

   2. Proscriptions

      1. Not only could you die legally

      2. Your land was confiscated

      3. Then a Broker would buy it

      4. Then sell it back to the Government for Veterans

      5. First under Sulla

      6. Then under Antony/Octavian

   3. Real Name

      1. Publius Vergilus Maro

   4. Virgil's Lifetime

      1. The Fall of the Republic

      2. Beginning of the Empire

   5. Works

      1. The Aeneid

         1. Some of the greatest works of Art ever made.

         2. He considered it unfinished

            1. "Executors, burn it all"

            2. We know this because it's got 6 unfinished lines

         3. Book 1: Aeneas is blown off course by Juno

            1. Dido is founding Carthage

            2. Juno hates him

               1. So she tries to get him to stay in Carthage.

               2. because he's a Trojan

            3. Venus loves him

               1. She knows he must found a great city.

         4. Book 2: The Past: the Fall of Troy at Dido's banquet

            1. Iulus (Ascanius) is kidnapped and replaced with Cupid

            2. Lost his wife in the burning city

               1. Creusa

         5. Book 3: they land on Sicily

            1. Anchises, Aeneas' father dies

            2. Then the book jumps back to the Storm

         6. Book 4: Aeneas' affair with Dido

            1. Why is it so complete?

            2. The Tragedy of Dido

         7. Aeneas

            1. Pius

         8. Dido

            1. Infelix

               1. Ill-Starred

            2. from the city of Tyre

               1. Her husband was murdered by her brother

               2. So Dido founded Carthage

      2. Georgics

         1. Hesiod Model

         2. Fit into Augustan Reforms well

         3. In the doorway of the Pax Romana

         4. Maeceanas didn't tell him to do it

            1. Significant artistic freedom

      3. Ecologues

         1. also known as Bucolics

         2. Ecologues based on the Greek "selections"

         3. 10 books, 10 shortish poems

            1. about 100 lines each

         4. Model

            1. Greek Poet Theocritus

               1. Alexandrinen

         5. Historical Context

            1. Virgil's family was involved in post-civil war land rush

         6. 1st & 9th

            1. Politically Charged

            2. Weird since Pastoral is not a political poetic genres

            3. Controversial

            4. Characters

               1. Old Man

                  1. Land Confiscated

               2. Young Man

                  1. "A young man" got him land.

         7. 10th

            1. Messianic Poem

            2. A child will return to earth

            3. Now, 30s BCE, is 30 years before Jesus

            4. Ehh, it's a common creation myth

2. Horace

   1. Son of a Freedman

   2. Son of a former-slave

   3. Horace's success tells us about access to education

   4. Horace relied on Patronage

3. Minor Poets

   1. Propertius

   2. Tibullus

4. Ovid

   1. Tried Politics, didn't care for it

   2. Modeled himself on Virgil

   3. Pastorals by Virgil

      1. Amores by Ovid

   4. Didactics by Virgil

      1. Sexual Mock-Didactics by Ovid

   5. Aeneid by Virgil

      1. Metamorphoses by Ovid

   6. Samuel Beckett to Virgil's James Joyce

   7. One of the major questions is, why was he exiled?

      1. he is elusive

      2. "et error"

      3. Augustus was trying to morally reform Rome

      4. Julian Hypothesis

         1. Julia and Ovid were exiled in the same year

            1. Julia, Augustus' daughter and grand-daughter

         2. Maybe he got mixed up in her whorishness

   8. Ovid was free from Patronage, since he could support himself

   9. Publius Ovidius Naso

   10. Dates

       1. Born 43 BC

       2. Died 17/18 AD

       3. Exiled in 8 AD by Augustus

5. Historical Context

   1. The "Golden Age" of Latin Literature

   2. The Augustan Age

   3. Ugly side

      1. Paranoia about heirs

      2. Paranoia about assassination

      3. Moralism

   4. Pax Augusta

6. Maeceanas

   1. First word of Horace's odes is Maeceanas

   2. Slipped out of the picture once they become too famous

7. Older Poets

   1. Hesiod

      1. Archaic Period

      2. 700 BC

      3. Wrote a Didactic Poem about Farming