The Shadow of Creusa: Negotiating Fictionality in Late Antique Latin Literature

727 Pages·2015·4.28 MB·English

by  Anders Cullhed

Anders Cullhed
The Shadow of Creusa
Beiträge zur Altertumskunde
Herausgegeben von Michael Erler, Dorothee Gall,
Ludwig Koenen und Clemens Zintzen
Band 339
Anders Cullhed
The Shadow
of Creusa
Negotiating Fictionality
in Late Antique Latin Literature
Translated by
Michael Knight
For Kerstin
ISBN 978-3-11-031086-3
e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-031094-8
e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-038836-7
ISSN 1616-0452
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress.
Bibliografische Information der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek
Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in der Deutschen
Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte bibliografische Daten sind im Internet über
http://dnb.dnb.de abrufbar.
© 2015 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Druck und Bindung: Hubert & Co. GmbH & Co. KG, Göttingen
∞ Gedruckt auf säurefreiem Papier
Printed in Germany
www.degruyter.com
“And death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor
pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.” And he who was seated
on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.” Also he said, “Write
this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”
Revelation 21.4–5
For “what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ
with Belial?” How can Horace go with the psalter, Virgil with the gospels, Cicero
with the apostle?
Jerome, Epistulae 22.29
Once I was fluent in the fictitious literature of men, but now I stutter in the
proclamation of the truth.
Paulinus of Nola, Epistulae 40.6
We pray therefore for a respite for the gods of our fathers and our native gods.
That which all venerate should in fairness be accounted as one. We look on the
same stars, the heaven is common to us all, the same world surrounds us. What
matters it by what arts each of us seeks for truth? We cannot arrive by one and
the same path at so great a secret.
Symmachus, Relationes 3.10

Preface
“Still,theydonotbelongtotheMuse”.ThosewerethewordsofsomeoneIknew,
aimed at certain other people that I happened to know.They could, in fact, be
applied to the majorityof the learned men (but hardly to the lady) that will be
underscrutinyinthepresentstudy.TheMuseswereaconstantsourceoftrouble
for early Christian intellectuals.The three greatest of the Latin Church Fathers,
more or less contemporary with each other, are crucial to my theme. Foremost
among them is Saint Augustine, followed by his seniors, Ambrose and Jerome.
Around them emerges a host of pious witnesses, missionaries, preachers and
learned men, accompanied byone or twoprofane writers.One ofthem,the en-
cyclopaedic Martianus Capella, entered into a competitive dialogue with his
Muse. So did his successor and North African compatriot Fulgentius, at least
untilheagreedtobeliterallyseducedbytheflirtatiousPieriangoddesses.Final-
ly,thelastRomanandthefirstScholastic,theingeniousBoethius,wasforced(or
forcedhimself)toexpelthemfromhiselegiaccomplaints–butonlyinorderto
preparefortheirreappearanceandtheirnewsongs,nowinadecidedlydifferent
key, in the service of Lady Philosophy.
ThisrelationshiptotheMuses,enthusiasticorantagonistic,willbetheunit-
ing bond between the main figures of this book. In addition, they have their
Latin language in common, reproduced in the original as well as translated
into English.The quotations from Latin will hopefully not make my exposition
seem inaccessible or difficult to assimilate for non-specialist readers.They are
necessary, because they stem from a culture two thousand years old; every at-
tempttoconvertthemintomodernEnglishimpliesanadaptationwhich,howev-
er, I am convinced we can live with as long as the original words are close at
hand.Amongthecriticaleditionsandscholarlyseriesthathavebeenatmydis-
posal,themajorityofwhicharebasedonaphilologicalexpertisefarsuperiorto
my own, I would like to emphasize the Italian Nuova Biblioteca Agostiniana
(NBA), created and issued by the editorial house Città Nuova in Rome. During
the last four decades, Città Nuova has published all of Augustine’s writings,
and even if its efforts have some international equivalents – like the Parisian
Desclée de Brouwer’s series Bibliothèque Augustinienne or the more recent
“Translation for the 21st Century” of Augustine’s work, printed with the late
John E. Rotelle as its founding director by New City Press in the U.S. – I know
of no other editorial firm or learned society which to such an extent has made
its Augustinian material available on the Web. The greatest of the Western
Church Fathers is thus accessible in a good edition to all interested readers
worldwide, in Latin as well as in a modern Italian translation.
VIII Preface
WheneverIhavefoundsatisfyingEnglishversionsoftheLateAntiquetexts
underexaminationhere,Ihaveconsistentlymadeuseofthem.Iwouldespecial-
lyliketomentionJamesJ.O’Donnell’s1992editionandMariaBoulding’strans-
lation (based on O’Donnell) of Augustine’s Confessiones (Confessions), as it is
probably the single most frequently quoted work in my book. In some cases I
havefeltobligedtosuggestalternativetranslations(mostlytoemphasizethelit-
eral sense of aword or sentence where the translator, for perfectly understand-
able reasons, has preferred more general or normalized equivalences), marked
by single quotes instead of the customary double ones. As for the Latin texts I
have had to grapple with on myown, I have tried to convert them into modern
Englishprose,withoutbotheringmuchaboutstylisticconsiderations,hopingto
achieve at least a minimum of legibility.Greek texts are generally presented in
English,butassoonasindividualtermsandconceptsfromtheworksofwriters
suchasPlutarch,OrigenorProclusacquirespecialsignificanceformyargument,
theyarerenderedinthe(transliterated)original.Myambitionhassimplybeento
satisfy both the general reader, interestedin these LateAntique negotiations of
fictionality which, incidentally, herald agood deal of modern literarycriticism,
and the initiated specialist.
Inordertofacilitateafluentreading,blockquotationsinprosearerendered
in English, while their wordings in the original language – mostly Latin – are
presented in the notes or,when extensive, in an appendix to the book. Poetic
texts,on the other hand,where rhythm, line breaks and the order of words ac-
quire a particular significance, are first presented in the original language and
immediatelyafterwards in Englishverse (orsometimes prose,dependingon ex-
tanttranslations).Ifthisarrangementsoundssomewhatcomplicated,Iamcon-
fident that it will be perceived as transparent and natural after a few pages of
reading.
Finally,mysecondarysourcesinlanguagesotherthanEnglisharegenerally
notgivenintheoriginal.Therearequiteafewofthem,duetothecomprehensive
subjectofmybook.Sadly,however,ithasbeenimpossibleformetocoverallmy
wiseandlearnedpredecessorsinafieldasvastasthis:themappingofLateAn-
tiquefictiontheoryintheWest.Icanonlyhopethatmyselectionofsourcesre-
flects as truly as possible the main lines of research carried out in this area.
*
WhethertheLateAntiqueChristianintellectualssetouttoeradicatetheworldof
classical myth or iconography, or whether they recommended some sort of res-
cue action or recycling, commonly by means of allegorical representation, it
was in the verbal arts that ideas of fictionality were most thoroughly tried and
tested.Consequently,textualandcontextualanalysisofliteraryworkswilloccu-
Preface IX
py the main part of this study, supplemented with glances at the period’s rich
commentary activities, its polemics, and its rhetorical or poetical ideas. I will
not enter deeply into stylistic matters, but problems of style will be discussed
for the simple reason that res and verba or, as we would say today, content
andform,wereinseparablefromeachotherinLateAntiquepoetryandpoetics.
Togiveashortexample: inLatinliterature,thehighstylewasgenerallyassoci-
atedwithpatheticmatters,andthemiddlestylewithsheerpleasure.Inthefor-
mer case,the readers or listeners of a poetic work were supposed to be moved
through its majestic tone, its eloquent pompa or cothurnus; in the latter case,
theaudienceexpectedtobeentertainedbymeansofvariousornamentsandem-
bellishments. Both styles would easily,by means of hyperbole, catachresis and
other stylisticdevices, lend themselves to fictional matters. Accordingly, a style
that differed from everydayspeech – whatMichael Roberts in adherence tothe
period’s own terminology has labelled “the jeweled style” – was frequently as-
sumed to indicate a subject that deflected from familiar reality.¹ On the other
hand, the third, low and satirical or didactic style could in some sense – we
shall try to see how – be experienced as expressive of real things and circum-
stances. Rhetorical and stylistic matters will therefore be treated whenever
they trigger issues of fictionality.
Whichtheydo,incidentally,quiteoften.Asamatteroffact,premoderncon-
cepts of fictionwere frequently linkedtofigurative language,which throughout
LateAntiquity was analysedand categorized in thegrammarians’orotheredu-
cators’ learned catalogues. My presentationwill respect thisgeneral pattern. In
addition,itwilldrawattentiontotheperiod’sconstructionsofthehumanimag-
ination,phantasiasiveimaginatio,asfar astheyareconnectedtofictionalmat-
ters. In short, a series of concepts from literary theory or the history of ideas,
suchas‘tropes’,‘allegory’or‘imagination’,willbeessentialtomyaccount.Pre-
ciselyforthatreasonitshouldbenotedthatthisisnotanattempttoformulate
evenaroughoutlineoftheLateAntiquehistoryofthedoctrineoftropesorofthe
concept of imagination. Such studies have already been published by other
scholars, and they would surely require quite another arrangement and other
limitationsthanthepresentwork.Iwillonlyrefertothoselearnedmatters–fig-
urative language, imagination,the liberal arts etc. – as far as they might eluci-
datethemainconcernofmyinvestigation.Evenwiththatrestrictionmysubject
mayseemawkwardlyvast,andIobviouslycannotclaimtohavedelineatedany
 Apartfromthejewels,gemmae,Robertsregistersflowers,flores,lightsandstars,luminaand
stellae,asparticularlyfrequentmetaphorsintheancientrhetoricalmanuals’treatmentofthe
extravagantstyle,1989,pp.47–65.