Meter: Fifth Asclepiadean

Horace Odes.I.11 Meter: Fifth or Greater Asclepiadean

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Tu ne quaesieris (scire nefas), quem mihi, quem tibi finem di dederint, Leuconoe, nec Babylonios temptaris numeros. ut melius, quidquid erit, pati! seu pluris hiemes, seu tribuit Iuppiter ultimam, quae nunc oppositis debilitat pumicibus mare 5

Tyrrhenum: sapias, vina liques, et spatio brevi spem longam reseces. dum loquimur, fugerit invida aetas: carpe diem, quam minimum credula postero. Horace Odes.I.11 Meter: Fifth or Greater Asclepiadean

Discussion Questions:

1. How can one see this poem as both philosophical and erotic in nature?

2. What is the relationship between speaker and addressee? How is it created? What is the effect of starting the poem with the word tu? Is this word grammatically necessary?

3. Compare the use of the word credulus in this poem with that in Ode I.5. Does the appearance of the word in both of these poems suggest any other points of comparison between them?

4. What do the words hiemes and ultimam in line 4 stand for in terms of human life? What effect does the winter have on the sea? What could the sea symbolize in this situation? Try to explain the strange inversion that Horace makes, that the sea does not wear down the rocks but instead is worn down against the rocks.

5. How do the words sapere (“to taste”, originally) and resecare (“to cut back”) reinforce the message contained in the phrase vina liques?

6. Compare Horace’s entreaty to Leuconoe here to Catullus’ plea to Lesbia in Poem 5. Which poem is more direct? How do you account for your answer?

7. This ode makes a contrast between things in life the individual can control and things in life the individual cannot control. How does the poet develop this contrast to help him set forth advice on how to live?

8. Compare the images of the sea in Odes I.5 and I.9 with the image in this poem.

9. Read the poem aloud in meter. What sense is conveyed by the meter? Horace Odes.I.11 Meter: Fifth or Greater Asclepiadean

10. Read the following poem by Robert Herrick (1591-1674). To whom is it addressed? What is requested of them? How is that request different from those contained in Horace I.11 and Catullus 5? Where else, especially in the use of words and images that suggest the passage of time, is this poem different from those of Horace and Catullus?

To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time

GATHER ye rosebuds while ye may, Old Time is still a-flying; And this same flower that smiles today Tomorrow will be dying. The glorious lamp of heaven, the sun, The higher he's a-getting, The sooner will his race be run, And nearer he's to setting. That age is best which is the first, When youth and blood are warmer; But being spent, the worse, and worst Times still succeed the former. Then be not coy, but use your time; And while ye may, go marry: For having lost but once your prime, You may for ever tarry.