Realism" in Graeco-Roman Fable As Depicted
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MAJORITY REAL: "REALISM" IN GRAECO-ROMAN FABLE AS DEPICTED THROUGH THE CROW AND RAVEN MAJORITY REAL: "REALISM" IN GRAECO-ROMAN FABLE AS DEPICTED THROUGH THE CROW AND RAVEN By DAVID WALLACE-HARE, B.A. A Thesis Submitted to the School of Graduate Studies in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts in Classics McMaster University © Copyright by David Wallace-Hare, August 2012 McMaster University MASTER OF ARTS IN CLASSICS (2012) Hamilton, Ontario (Classics) TITLE: Majority Real: "Realism" in Graeco-Roman Fable As Depicted Through the Crow and Raven AUTHOR: David Wallace-Hare, B.A. (McMaster University) SUPERVISOR: Professor P.M. Murgatroyd NUMBER OF PAGES: vii, 133 ii ABSTRACT David Wallace-Hare: Majority Real: "Realism" in Graeco-Roman Fable As Depicted Through the Crow and Raven (Under the direction of Professor Paul Murgatroyd, Professor Sean Corner, and Professor Claude Eilers) The role of realism in the depiction of animals in Greaco-Roman fable is investigated. The crow and the raven have been chosen as the prism through which the investigation is carried out. Fable will be shown to be a genre founded on a contextually realistic depiction of animals, and this may especially be seen in the corvid fables. Realism must, however, be understood contextually, as what constitutes a realistic depiction of crows and ravens in Graeco-Roman times is quite different than what one would encounter at present. As a result of which the crow and raven are marked by attributes ranging from cleverness, parenting ability, resistance to weather, vocal mimicry, longevity, and augural significance, amongst a host of other characteristics which sometimes coincide with modern views but often do not. Thus Graeco-Roman fables dealing with crows and ravens can be broadly divided into two categories: fables dealing in various ways with their intelligence, and fables dealing with their augural significance. iii DEDICATION MATRI MEAE Nunc in caelo; laeta, alata, dolore soluta es. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my supervisor Professor Paul Murgatroyd and the other members of my thesis committee Professor Sean Corner and Professor Claude Eilers for their insight and advice. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter One: Introduction Chapter Two: Fabulae Intelligentiae Chapter Three: Fabulae Augurales Chapter Four: Conclusion vi DECLARATION OF ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT The author declares that the content of this research has been completed by David Alan Wallace-Hare, with gratitude for the contributions of his supervisory committee consisting of Professor Paul Murgatroyd, Professor Sean Corner, and Professor Claude Eilers. The author hopes that he has furthered the study of ancient fable by the employment of a novel approach for its treatment, namely the use of modern ornithological and ethological works to the end of investigating the quality of realism in Graeco-Roman fable. Further, he hopes that his thesis has shown that realism was an important factor in the depiction of animals in Graeco-Roman fable contrary to popular belief and prevailing scholarship. vii M.A. Thesis - D. Wallace-Hare; McMaster University - Classics Chapter One: Introduction Are stereotypes realistic? Accurate? Truthful? What about animal stereotypes, are they realistic? For example, are foxes clever; are eagles noble; are lions brave? Are these not stereotypes? Many, however, might have answered yes to those three questions. If most or even very many answer yes, is that not a reality, which constitutes the majority opinion, even if scientifically and factually untrue (by more objective standards)?1 Thus typecasting, in some ways, is a, or rather, one window to perceived reality.2 Whether such 1 "And now for the eagle! I hate to shatter the fabulous illusions about this glorious bird, but I must adhere to the truth: all true birds of prey are, compared with passerines or parrots, extremely stupid creatures. This applies particularly to the golden eagle, "the eagle" of our mountains and our poets, which is one of the most stupid among them, much more indeed than any barnyard fowl. This, of course, does not preclude this proud bird from being beautiful and impressive.... but here we have to deal with mental qualities of the creature, its supposed love of freedom and its imaginary suffering in captivity." (Lorenz, King Solomon's Ring: New Light On Animal Ways (London, 1965), 51). Lorenz goes on to cite a memorable anecdote on his disillusionment about eagles. He also discusses animal stereotypes in the same section, 49 ff. 2 Out of colossal scholarship on the subject of stereotypes and stereotyping, see especially, Leyens, Yzerbyt, and Schadron, Stereotypes and Social Cognition (London, 1994). Oakes, Haslam, and.Turner, Stereotyping and Social Reality (Oxford, 1994.). Both works include extensive bibliographies, offer excellent definitions of 'stereotype,' and analyze historical usages and applications of the term as well as the positive and negative associations of stereotyping. Although much has been written on stereotype, much of the literature is derivative of earlier works and replies to studies and thus a few citations are enough to give a good impression of what is representative of the scholarship in general. Too much ought not to be read into the idea of stereotype in fable, although it is a useful model for understanding the idea of "static" animal behaviour in antiquity. I have not included works on animal rights (which do cover stereotypes towards animals) for the reason that they often tend to be written from a biased perspective, that is, they consistently write in favour of animals and animal rights, a perspective almost wholly absent from the Graeco-Roman literature, as seen in fable and elsewhere, where the "stereotypes" are actually beliefs and not considered abnormal, deviant, or prejudicial in any way. Thus for an ass to be beaten during its lifetime and then have its worn-out hide on death turned into a tambourine and thus be beaten in the afterlife is treated with levity 1 M.A. Thesis - D. Wallace-Hare; McMaster University - Classics stereotypes are verfiably true need not matter to those who employ them especially if they are not perceived as stereotypes. Stereotypes can basically be defined as (usually group- based) assumptions about a particular class of person (or animal) which categorize the individual of that group as interchangeable based on that category: i.e. foxes are clever, hence that fox over there coming out of the woods, is clever by default.3 What about 'positive' stereotypes, such as some of the more laudatory ones mentioned above? If the majority believe that crows are funereal, a negative view, does that mean it is true? National stereotypes do not enter into the picture here, in Greek fable and Latin all that matters is the opinions of either the Greeks or Romans respectively. If most ancient Greeks believe ravens to be intelligent, and the opinions and beliefs of the Greeks are the only possible or significant opinions, most means a lot. What happens when even scientists (that is philosophers when dealing with Greek antiquity) concur that something is true in addition to it being widely believed but that truth later (millennia so) proves to be just a stereotype?4 If even they believe it, how is that not reality, at the time at any in fable and meant to cause the audience to laugh. Of course, there were dissenting viewpoints, animal-rights-minded individuals, mostly rich and fully leisured and away from the farm and dirt of the fields, like Plutarch, and those who decried the brutality of the Colisseum, all minority opinions. 3 Leyens, et al., 11: "Let's agree on a very general defintion of stereotypes: they are shared beliefs about person attributes, usually personality traits, but often also behaviours, of a group of people....the process of stereotyping is the process of applying a - stereotypical - judgement such as rendering these individuals interchangeable with other members of the category." See also 17-18. Although the definition Leyens, et al gives is dealing with people, it can easily be used for stereotyped behaviours of animals, especially fabular animals. 4 Cf. Aristotle's comment on the character of sheep/ herd animals (Arist. HA VIII.III.): "Now, the characters of animals, as has been said earlier, differ both in respect to cowardice, mildness, courage, and gentleness and in respect to intelligence and stupidity. 2 M.A. Thesis - D. Wallace-Hare; McMaster University - Classics rate? What happens when stereotypes are not recognized as such but rather are merely perceived as reality, as, after all, reality is merely the tacit or active agreement of the majority on the existence of things? A stereotype, then, becomes a belief, which is much harder to explain away. In Graeco-Roman antiquity we are dealing dually with stereotypification and contextually accurate animal observation to such a degree that it becomes a problem of disentangling what is the stereotype and what the observation of nature. Sometimes the two coincide, sometimes singly occur, and sometimes they run parallel. These phenomena are especially apparent in fable, a genre which actively promotes the notion that the characters in it are true to life and act according to nature on the one hand, while at the same time it advocates the traditional 'characters' of animals as fulfilling this true-to-life requirement, as will be discussed shortly. If the static/fixed/stereotyped (however one wishes to describe it) characters of animals are said to be true to life, does that mean realistic? Hopefully the current work will serve to shed light on what realism in fable constitutes. It must be noted that no animal in fable is ever depicted behaving in a wholly realistic fashion from modern standards of ethology. Fable is not attempting to be natural history, though it sometimes draws on natural history (which often does share with fable common beliefs about animals) but it does claim to realistically portray the true For the character of sheep, as it is said, is naïve and brainless.