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Ancient and Modern: Catullus li Again

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 January 2009

L. P. Wilkinson
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Extract

It sometimes happens that the plausibility of an interpretation of a passage in the Classics depends on our estimate of what is likely in human terms in any age. It may be worth while in such cases to adduce modern parallels. Here is an example.

Munro suggested long ago that, from its passionate tone, Catullus li (‘Ille mi par esse deo …’) should be taken as one of his first poems to Clodia, and that this (besides metrical equivalence) would account for his choosing the name of Lesbia as a pseudonym, the poem being a free translation of one addressed by Sappho to a Lesbian girl. Macnaghten and Ramsay develop this idea significantly in their introduction to the poem: ‘Probably the earliest poem to Lesbia, written perhaps in 62 B.c. It is a translation of Sappho's song to a Lesbian girl, chosen by Catullus, not because lover's language is in all ages the same, but as the safest way of revealing to Clodia the secret of his love. If she cared for him, she could hardly mistake his meaning; if not, it was only a translation after all.’

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Type
Research Article
Information
Greece & Rome , Volume 21 , Issue 1 , April 1974, pp. 82 - 85
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1974

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References

page 82 note 1 Munro, H. A. J., Criticisms and Elucidations of Catullus (London, 1878), 195.Google Scholar

page 82 note 2 Macnaghten, H. V. and Ramsay, A. B., Poems of Catullus 2 (London, 1908), 112.Google Scholar

page 82 note 3 Bayet, J., Boyancé, P., Klingner, F., Pöschl, V., Rostagni, A., Fondation Hardt Entretiens II (Geneva, 1956)Google Scholar: L'influence grecque sur la poésie latine de Catulle à Ovide, 47–8.Google Scholar

page 82 note 4 Pace Wiseman, T. P., Catullan Questions (Leicester, 1969), 50 ff.Google Scholar

page 83 note 1 It should be said that the poem from Desportes is attributed to Sir Arthur Gorges as well as to Raleigh: Oakeshott, 166–9. Dr. Oakeshott assures me that he did not know that a similar suggestion had been made regarding Catullus li.

page 83 note 2 Mackail, J. W., Latin Literature (London, 1895), p. 57 n.Google Scholar

page 84 note 1 Fordyce, C. J., Catullus (Oxford, 1961), 219.Google Scholar

page 84 note 2 Tradition and Originality in Roman Poetry (Oxford, 1968), 491.Google Scholar

page 84 note 3 This view is represented by Ellis, Robinson, Catutti Veronensis Liber (Oxford, 1878), xlvi–lGoogle Scholar, and expounded by Wheeler, A. L. in Catullus and the Traditions of Ancient Poetry (Berkeley, 1934), Ch. 1.Google Scholar See also Fordyce's Appendix II. For opposing views see Wiseman, , op. cit. 1–31Google Scholar, and Quinn, K., ‘Trends in Catullan Criticism’, in H. Temporini (ed.), Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischer Welt (1973), 386–7.Google Scholar

page 85 note 1 In the text of Propertius passages of four to eight lines, some of which could be self-contained poems, have become attached to longer elegies to which they do not seem to belong, at ii. 9. 49—52, 18. 1—4, 22. 43—50, and iii. 35—40 (see W. A. Camps's commentary).

page 85 note 2 I am grateful to Mr. A. G. Lee for commenting on an earlier draft of this article.