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134 JACQUELINE CLARKE<br />

Odes and the world of Greek lyric poetry. This elegy appears to be a<br />

deliberate echo of Horace Carm. 3.25. where Horace makes an appeal<br />

to Bacchus to enable him to write poetry on political themes'6; Horace<br />

intends to set the eternal glory of great Caesar among the stars and in<br />

the council of Jupiter (3-6). This divine inspiration is important because.<br />

as Horace himself states. he is attempting something completely<br />

new in the history of Roman poetry:<br />

dicam insigne recens adhuc<br />

indictum ore alio<br />

I shall sing something fresh and famous.<br />

never spoken by another mouth<br />

As Williams comments. "this type of poetry was virtually an invention<br />

of Augustan poetry. "'7<br />

It could be argued that Propertius. with this deliberate echo of Horace.<br />

is teasing the reader by implying that he will take a similar political<br />

direction with his work. If this is the case. then the reader's expectations<br />

are not met, for Propertius does not continue the elegy in this<br />

direction but travels rather to the world of Greek mythology and Pindar.<br />

who often included such myths in his poems. 18 But it is interesting<br />

that his claim of inspiration from Pindar anticipates Horace's tribute to<br />

Pindar in his Fourth Book of Odes (4.2.1), for the image of poet as<br />

priest goes back to Pindar. 19 Propertius thus lays claim to a similar<br />

16 Hubbard (above. n. 2) 72 also draws a parallel with the other Bacchic poem<br />

Carm. 2.19. but I agree with J.F. Millar. "Propertius' Hymn to Bacchus and contemporary<br />

poetry." AJPh 112 (1991) 78. that the resemblances to this ode may be<br />

due to nothing more than the conventional literary treatment of the god. Carm.<br />

3.25. on the other hand. has specific verbal similarities to elegy 3.11' see Millar 78.<br />

80.<br />

'7 G. Williams. The Third Book of Horace's Odes (Oxford 1969) 31. In Book 4.<br />

Propertius in his role as a Roman Callimachus once again makes an appeal to<br />

Bacchus (1.62-4).<br />

18 Miller (above.n. 16) 79 agrees with this but further suggests that the elegy<br />

also contains deliberate echoes of Tibullus (81-2) that help to anchor the text in<br />

the elegiac tradition. If this is the case (and Millar admits the verbal echoes are<br />

rather slight). then it is another way of teasing the reader; the elegy has a foot<br />

firmly planted in both worlds leaving the reader uncertain as to which direction<br />

Propertius will take. As Millar comments. "He turns to Tibullus and Horace for<br />

new ideas for his poetic experiment. but in each case ultimately distances himself<br />

from his fellow poets" (86). See Butrica (above. n. 4) 140. who is also of the view<br />

that Propertius' apparent uncertainty of direction in Book 3 is deliberate.<br />

19 Hubbard (above. n. 2) 75. J.K. Newman. Augustan Propertius: The Recapitulation<br />

ofa Genre (Hildesheim 1997) 263 cites the opening of the second Dithyramb<br />

(Sn.-M·74)·

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