DIFFICILE EST SATVRAM NVNC SCRIBERE Satire in the Corporate Media Age

Martin M. Winkler (Fairfax, Virginia)

The textual change in my title to one of Juvenal’s most famous lines may prompt the question whether the same situation was true tunc (»then«); that is, in ancient Rome. Classical scholars will immediately think of terms such as libertas or parrhesia,both of which express what we would today call »freedom of speech.« Horace opens Sermones 1.4 with the observation that the writers of Old Comedy – he names Eupolis, Cratinus, and Aristophanes – had exposed vice and crime »with great freedom« (multa cum libertate) and that the early Roman satirist Lucilius followed their example, if in a different genre; he, Horace, will in turn follow Lucilius.1 But even in democratic Athens Aristophanes was twice charged with slander by the popular politician Cleon, although he was not convicted, and everybody knows what happened to Socrates for exercising his parrhesia. Earlier authors of iambs, especially Archilochus and Hipponax, had been highly effective in their attacks but still had to reckon with unpleasant consequences.2 Later on, Diogenes and other Cynics generally remained safe even if they did their best to »push the buttons,« as Americans call it today, of the good citizens around them. Perhaps the Cynics were safe because they were social outsiders or, in modern terms, dropouts who formed a counterculture to the establishment.3 They were also largely ineffective. Quintilian declared verse satire to be entirely Roman because it had not been a literary genre in Greece.4 But most of the Greeks mentioned above clearly exhibit the spirit of satire and may be considered honorary members of the satirists’ guild. In Rome, satire goes back to Ennius and Lucilius. In his programmatic Satire 1, Juvenal twice pays tribute to Lucilius, portraying him as a kind of epic hero who swoops down on vice and folly on his chariot, swinging, as it were, his stylus like amightysword.5 But Lucilius had a powerful patron to protect him, and so did Horace, the close friend of Maecenas and Augustus. Consequently, the reputation

1 Hor. sat. 1.4.1–8 and 2.1.34. 2 On the Greek iambic poets see, e.g., the »Introduction« to Gerber (1999) 1–12. On Archilochus as effective satirist cf. Testimonia 19–32 in Gerber (1999) 46–57 (the fate of Lycambes and his daughters). Plut. Cato 7 reports that Cato the Elder attacked Scipio the Elder in the manner of Archilochus, thereby introducing to Rome the iamb as political invective. 3 On Diogenes cf. the account, unsurpassed in its vividness, of Schwartz (1956) 133–4. See further Green (1992) 614–7. 4 Quint. inst. 10.1.93: satura quidem tota nostra est. 5 Iuv. 1.20 (magnus equos Auruncae flexit alumnus)and165–6(ense velut stricto … Lucilius ardens / infremuit). 262 Martin M. Winkler of Horace came to suffer a critical split as author of the Odes and as author of satires, the Sermones. The greatness of Horace as a lyric poet is readily acknowledged, but the writer of satire could be and was repeatedly disparaged. Horace became, as it were, a tame bird singing its mild satiric songs from inside a gilded imperial cage. In retrospect it has not helped Horace that his satiric motto is virtually Epicurean: »laughingly to tell the truth.«6 This is an example of to spoudaiogeloion, the mixture of earnest seriousness (to spoudaion) and the risible (to geloion),butitisalsoinstark contrast to Lucilius, whom Juvenal calls ardens (»burning«) in his desire for satiric attack. It is even more in contrast to Juvenal himself, who in Satire 1 professes to be guided by yet stronger passions and to write with the rising bile of anger and indignation.7 In 1692 John Dryden, the great British poet, translator, and satirist, compared Horatian and Juvenalian satire and came down in favor of Juvenal’s: I wou’d willingly divide the Palm betwixt them; upon the two Heads of Profit and Delight, which are the two Ends of Poetry in general. It must be granted by the Favourers of Juvenal,thatHorace is the more Copious, and Profitable in his Instructions of Humane Life. But in my particular Opinion … Juvenal is the more delightful Author. I am profited by both, I am pleas’d with both; but I owe more to Horace for my Instruction; and more to Juvenal, for my Pleasure. But, after all, I must confess, that the Delight which Horace gives me, is but languish- ing … Juvenal is of a more vigorous and Masculine Wit, he gives me as much Pleasure as I can bear: He fully satisfies my Expectation, he Treats his Subject home: His Spleen is rais’d, and he raises mine: I have the Pleasure of Concernment in all he says; He drives his Reader along with him; and when he is at the end of his way, I willingly stop with him … Add to this, that his Thoughts are as just as those of Horace, and much more Elevated. His Expressions are Sonorous and more Noble; his Verse more numerous, and his Words are suitable to his Thoughts, sublime and lofty … Horace is always on the Amble; Juvenal on the Gallop … He goes with more impetuosity than Horace;butas securely; and the swiftness adds a more lively agitation to the Spirits. And besides this, the Sauce of Juvenal is more poignant, to create in us an Appetite of Reading him. The Meat of Horace is more nourishing; but the Cookery of Juvenal more exquisite; so that, granting Horace to be the more general Philosopher; we cannot deny, that Juvenal was the greater Poet, I mean in Satire. His Thoughts are sharper, his Indignation against Vice is more vehement; his Spirit has more of the Commonwealth Genius; he treats Tyranny, and all the Vices attending it, as they deserve, with the utmost rigour: And consequently, a Noble Soul is better pleas’d with a Zealous Vindicator of Roman Liberty; than with a Temporizing Poet, a well Manner’d Court Slave, and a Man who is often afraid of Laughing in the right place: Who is ever decent, because he is naturally servile.8

6 Hor. sat. 1.1.24: ridentem dicere verum; cf. sat. 1.10.14–5 (ridiculum acri / fortius). Except in the early invectives (sat. 1.1–3), there is almost no biting attack in Horace’s satire. 7 Iuv. 1.30–1, 45, and 79 (the famous facit indignatio versum). 8 These passages are from Dryden’s Discourse Concerning the Original and Progress of Satire,theepistle dedicatory of his translations of Juvenal and Persius to Charles, Earl of Dorset and Middlesex: The Satyrs of Decimus Junius Juvenalis and of Aulus Persius Flaccus. Translated into English Verse by Mr.