lecture 5 part 3
what is the contradiction in Horace’s idea ?
Horace wants Roman authors to imitate the Greeks night and day and follow in their footsteps, but he does not want them to be mere imitators
2) what was his solution for this ?
only a set of metaphors with no practical steps (stay away from the round and vulgar)
3)can you see the same contradiction in Horace’s poetry ?
yes you can
4) who wrote the “Epistle to Maecenas “?
Horace
5) what does he complain about in the Epistle to Maecenas?
the slavish imitators who ape the morals and manners of their betters
6) who are their betters ?
the greeks
7)In the process of following and imitating the Greeks, Horace differentiates himself from what ?
those who “mimic” the ancients and slavishly attempt to reproduce them
8) what did he think of that kind of imitation ?
he did not have much esteem for that kind of imitation and saw his own practice to be different
9) who said “I was the first to plant free footstep on a virgin soil; I walked not where others trod. ?
Horace
10)In imitating the Greeks, Horace claims originality is this accurate?
the bold claim he makes of walking on virgin soil strongly contradicts the implied detail that the soil was not virgin, since Greek predecessors had already walked it
11) who said the precise nature of what Horace claims to have brought back from his “walk” is not clear “?
Thomas Greene
12) what does Horace advises the aspirant poet in Ars Poetica ?
to make his tale believable
13)who said “If you want me to cry, mourn first yourself, then your misfortunes will hurt me” ?
Horace
14) what does he mean by make the tale believable ?
If you depict a coward, Horace advises, make the depiction close to a real person who is a coward
But Horace only had a stylistic feature in mind.
15) who said Horace could not even think of poetry, all poetry, as an imitation, the way the idea is expressed in Book X of the Republic, or in Aristotle’s Poetics ?
Craig La Drière
16)Horace’s ideas about imitating the Greeks and about poetry imitating real life models were both what?
imprecise
17) what affect will they have on Europe?
they will become very influential in shaping European art and literature
18) what did Horace use the principles of taste and “sensibility for?
to distinguish what he thought was “civilized” from “uncivilized” poetry
*19) what will those principals be instrumental in shaping ?
instrumental in shaping the European distinction between official high culture and popular low one
20)Horace’s ideas helped form the conception of what ?
literature and poetry as national monuments and trophies
21) Poetry in Horace’s text was subordinated to what ?
to oratory and the perfection of self-expression
22) who is reduced to classroom examples of correct speaking for rhetoricians to practice with ?
Homer and Sophocles
23)what does the idea of following the Greeks result in in the opinion of
Thomas Greene ?
it magnified the temporal and cultural distance with them
24) who wrote Institutio Oratoria ?
Quintilian
25) Quintilian was the leading teacher of what ?
the leading teacher of rhetoric in Rome
26) when was this?
From 68 to 88 C.E
27)why did he write the Institutio ?
to help in the training of orators
Sometimes Quintilian justifies the imitation of the Greeks , but still thinks its dangerous
28) what are the two contradictory positions Quintilian advocates ?
1)that progress could be achieved only by those who refuse to follow, hence the undesirability of imitating the Greeks
2)Quintilian continues to advocate imitation, and goes on to elaborate a list of precepts to guide writers to produce “accurate” imitations
29) who said The imitator should consider carefully whom to imitate and he should not limit himself to one model only?
Quintilian
30)what did Seneca do ?
he singled out the process of transformation that takes place when bees produce honey or when food, after it is eaten, turns into blood and tissue
31) what did Seneca explore ?
the process of mollification and its chemistry
32)Latin authors never discuss poetry or literature as an imitation (mimesis) but as what ?
as an imitation of the Greeks
33)why aren't Latin authors familiar with Plato’s and Aristotle’s analysis of poetry ?
The Poetics or Republic III and X do not seem to have been available to the Romans
34)Latin authors used poetry and literature for two things , what are they ?
- To improve eloquence
- To sing the national glories of Rome and show off its culture.