![]() ![]() Which my stomach gave to me, not undeserving,Īt this point, a chilling illness and persistent cough This connects Poem 14 with another poem, 44, where the comically amplified motif of bad literature (although, in this case, not poetry but oratory) bringing disease on the reader is also elaborated: Interestingly, he calls their poetry omnia venena, “all poisonous rubbish”(14.19). We know more about the importance of bad poetry for Catullus: with comic exaggeration he calls the poetasters saecli incommoda, “pests of the period” (14.23). In Poem 14 his opinion suggests some metrical inadequacies: at 14.21–22 we read abite / illuc unde malum pedem attulistis, “be gone from here, where an ill foot brought you,” with word play on the word pes, meaning both “foot” as body part and “foot” as part of the poem’s metre. We must extrapolate from his scarce, ironic comments and short remarks. What is so bad in their poetry? Unfortunately, Catullus does not discuss their bad poetry in detail. Now Calvus will be forced to taste his own medicine. Such a joke cannot go unpunished: Catullus announces that he will go to the booksellers’ stalls and get the selection of the worst of the worst: the Caesii, the Aquinii and the works of Suffenus himself. Poor Catullus! He mentions in the poem that he almost died of boredom on “the Saturnalia, choicest of days” (14.14–15). ![]() These were written and given to Calvus, as Catullus suspects, by Sulla litterator, the poetaster Sulla (14.9), a client of Calvus. However, he decided to be mean and send his friend a collection of very bad poems. This would have been a welcome offering if the verses had been written by Calvus himself. Calvus, whose witty sense of humour is praised by Catullus elsewhere (53.5), this time decided to make a practical joke at the expense of his friend: as a gift for the Saturnalia, he sent Catullus a book of poems. Catullus addresses this poem to his dear friend Licinius Calvus, a well-known orator and poet whose works he admired and respected. Reading through the surviving works of Catullus in their current order (but whether it is in the author’s original order is a different question), we first encounter the question of bad poetry in Poem 14, in a rather surprising and amusing context. And this figure knew no mercy for bad poets and bad poetry.Ĭatullus reading his poetry, Stefan Bakałowicz, 1885 (Tretjakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia). What we do know for sure, however, is how Catullus the character felt. Was the real Catullus suffering because his beloved Juventius scorned his kisses? Did he truly feel like forgiving Juno, when the woman he adored kept betraying him with scores of others? And could he really not forgive the poetasters of his time, even if they were privately “fair spoken, witty and urbane,” as he himself characterizes one of his unfortunate victims in Poem 22? We will never know. My Catullus is the character of his poems, who obviously shares a lot with the author, but exactly how great this overlap is we cannot really tell. ![]() When I say “Catullus” here, I mean not the poet born in Gallic Verona around 84 BC of his life apart from poetry, we know little enough. Even a cursory reading of his surviving works would prove that statement true: he enjoyed the company of his colleagues and spending time composing poetry together he loved exchanging poetic gifts (and hated when they turn out to be something he did not expect, Poem 14) he praised lavishly the verses of his friends (Poem 95) and he proved his admiration for past masters by both translating and evoking their works in his own oeuvre (see especially Poems 51 and 66).Īt the same time, however, Catullus hated bad poetry – hated it with a passion he otherwise reserved for his rivals in love and the politicians he despised. ![]() 84–54 BC) loved poetry and the company of poets. ![]()
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