Five Great Representations of Pompeii in Popular Culture

in the context of a bigger debate about even have to come up with a reason the curriculum, and also in a way that to hit a list of random Famous Things isn’t just lecturing people - that isn’t just About Italy (in an order than makes no navel gazing. And there are issues that are Five Great geographical sense). The Roman Forum worth debating. How do you justify Latin and the Colosseum are kept for the in an already packed curriculum? I think Representations climax, but Pompeii makes it into Italy’s you’ve got to do it in better ways than it Greatest Hits alongside the Leaning helps you to learn French better, because of Pompeii in Tower of Pisa, a picturesque Tuscan why not just learn French better? I gave a village and a McDonald’s that serves lecture in New York: ‘Do the Classics have Popular Culture wine. a future?’ It wasn’t my title, but it worked Are we here for anything other than and the audience was packed. There was by Juliette Harrisson an erupting volcano? No. We’re here a long discussion. We need to think about for a single, volcano-based sight gag. how to make sure it would be more edgy. ‘Does Latin have a future?’ We’re thinking oor Pompeii. If Roman Britain Do we see the famous plaster casts? has a PR problem, being known of debating big questions about learning: P Sort of. only for rain, Boudicca and the non- what we value in society. What is the role disappearance of the Ninth Legion, of Latin in the classroom? Or in broader Worth a watch: Lisa inaccurately claims Pompeii has it much worse. Pompeii is society? Is it irrelevant? I think we’ll get that the victims of Pompeii (which is people for that. I’d like to get some kids known for one thing and one thing only: being destroyed by a volcano. This is given the spelling of the modern town, too. Does Pompeii have a future? Who inevitable, really, as Pompeii’s destruction Pompei, not the ancient Roman spelling) knows? But there are different forms of was so dramatic and spectacular, it would were frozen in whatever position classical learning and culture. It’s not just seem a waste to take one’s fictional they died, implying that the ‘bodies’ a six month exhibition and then it’s all Roman characters there and not cover it are actually petrified corpses. Which, over. in some way (besides, if anyone goes to of course, they’re not. It’s probably the Bay of Naples in earlier-set Roman worth it, however, as it allows the show fiction, they go to Baiae, the party to revisit one of its favourite jokes. i.Although the exhibition has now closed, for town, as do actual Romans in historical Throughout the twenty-plus years The further details, seem www.getty.edu/art/ sources). And so, in this article we list Simpsons has been on air, Homer has exhibitions/pompeii/. The catalogue is still five especially successful representations frequently been seen choking Bart when available. of Pompeii in modern popular media; angry (a ‘horrible act of child abuse,’ as but the list might as well be called ‘Five documentary-spoof episode ‘Behind the ii. Great Representations of the Eruption Laughter’ pointed out, that ‘became one A Point of View: Pompeii’s not-so-ancient of Vesuvius in AD 79.’ of our most beloved running gags’). So, Roman Remains can be read at http://www. It’s worth noting here that among of course, when the family discover a bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20407286. the best known images from Pompeii are Roman family who look just like them, the famous ‘bodies’, which are actually iii. Roman-Homer has been killed in the act ‘Oh, the poor, poor dog’. Cartoon by plaster casts (Mary Beard recently of choking Roman-Bart. Christian Wilhlem Allers, 1892. http:// reflected on these for BBC Radio 4’s A Point of View). There were no commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Allers_ 4. Pompeii: The Last Day human remains in the city when it was Napoli_135_Pompei.jpg excavated. Instead there were holes in the solidified deposits that were human- Why are we in Pompeii? For a BBC iv.Allan McCollum’s The Dog from Pompei shaped, and so Victorian archaeologists docu-drama whose title was presumably (1991). Originally the artist wanted to poured plaster into the holes to produce inspired by Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s replicate the carbonised loaf of bread in the statue-like images of the attitudes in famous nineteenth century novel, The Naples archaeological museum – a kind of which these people died, where the Last Days of Pompeii, and its various replication of something banal, simple and in ash and stones originally encased their adaptations. its own way replicated constantly in the ancient bodies after they’d been killed by the pyroclastic flow. More human-looking world – not just in Pompeii. However, the Are we here for anything other than than skeletons, they’re very moving to Italian authorities decided that the loaf was too an erupting volcano? No. Bulwer- delicate to be submitted to the casting process. look at and dominate representations of the eruption. Lytton’s novel was full of preachy stuff about terrible Roman morals and how v.The Cast Gallery, properly called the Museum 5. The Simpsons, ‘The Italian Bob’ somehow this led to death by volcano; of Classical Archaeology, is housed above the but that sort of thing’s gone out of Faculty of Classics in Cambridge. It contains Why are we in Pompeii? The Simpsons fashion (partly for being untrue) and Victorian (mostly) plaster casts of sculptures does Italy, taking the title characters on this docu-drama is all about getting to and friezes from the ancient world. a tour in Mr Burns’ new car. They don’t everybody’s horrible deaths. POMPEII EXHIBITION FEATURE - Five Great Representations of Pompeii in Popular Culture 55 Do we see the famous plaster casts? setting for general Roman-set hijinks, family just before the full force of the Oh yes. presumably because it’s the best known pyroclastic flow hits the town. (Which Roman town outside of the City of was caused by the Doctor and Donna, Worth a watch: Docu-dramas are odd Rome itself. The film spun off from who had to blow up Vesuvius to save beasts – often, you can’t help feeling that the series is more focused on working the Earth from a Pyrovile. Obviously.) things ought to be either documentaries up to the eruption, but even in the film or dramas. Either talk about the this only occurs at the end, to provide a Worth a watch: ‘The Fires of Pompeii’ evidence and the debates surrounding a suitably dramatic climax. was the episode that showed us the sort topic, or write a proper fictionalisation of Doctor Who companion relatively Do we see the famous plaster casts? of it. Docu-dramas can be particularly new cast member Donna could be. Her Much like the Simpsons example above - problematic when they imply, or their debut as a regular character, ‘Partners sort of. audience believe, that their largely in Crime,’ was funny, but ‘Pompeii’ is fictionalised version of events is Worth a watch: There’ve been better dramatic and moving, show-casing not somehow the ‘correct’ or ‘true’ one. At just Catherine Tate’s acting but how least when people watch a fictionalised comedies set in ancient Rome; A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum the team would be writing for Donna. drama, they know it’s fictionalised and for one, which inspired Up Pompeii! in The show has repeated many times don’t expect anything else. the first place, and certainly Carry on over the last few years its mantra that However, it’s worth making Cleo. But Up Pompeii! is entertaining the Doctor needs a companion to keep an exception for this very well enough. And then, at the end of the him grounded and provide an emotional made programme because there are film, the volcano erupts. The film connection with the people he meets, advantages to using the docu-drama has been so completely silly that it’s but this is one of the episodes that format to tell the story of Pompeii. We impossible to take the eruption entirely shows this most effectively. And, of in the twenty-first century understand seriously, and yet the knowledge that course, the icing on the cake is that the details concerning the nature of the what is being presented is the real-life pyroclastic flow that destroyed the people Donna persuades the Doctor death of hundreds of people means a to save are Caecilius and his family, city that the Romans didn’t; and so a certain level of gravity is required. It’s characters from the Cambridge Latin modern narrator can explain what’s hard to say whether the film achieves Course books that very many children happening much more clearly than the required balance - the characters who learn Latin in school in the UK and Roman characters within a story would from the series being frozen in awkward be able to. The geology of how the moments (rather inaccurately implying US use. And, for everyone who didn’t volcano erupted and the different they’re somehow turned to stone) are learn Latin in school, Caecilius was also (though equally gory) ways people died half funny, half a bit strange. On the a real person and you can visit his house in Pompeii and nearby Herculaneum are other hand, there’s something about in Pompeii.

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