Was Catullus a Pornographer?
WHAT is it about Catullus, that makes him "the Roman Mozart"? Both died in
their 30s, both are revered as consummate geniuses; both created works of art that
are perennially "fresh," because they arise from the compost of a fundamental
humanity, which like the human form remains unchanged through out the ages.
Catullus is, without question, the most popular and well known Roman poet
of our era, because we have shed the taboos of prior ages which admired some of
his carmina, while keeping others in locked cages. Let us begin by looking at two
juxtaposed: the first [V/5] being the most famous work by a Roman poet; the other [XLVIII/48] being scarcely known at all.
| V
VIVAMVS Lesbia mea, atque amemus.
rumoresque senum severioum
omnes unius aestimemus assis.
soles occidere et redire possunt:
nobis cum semel occident brevis lux
nox est perpetua una dormienda.
da mi basia mille, deine centum
dein mille altera, dein secunda centum.
dein, cum milia multa fecerimus,
conturbabimus illa, ne sciamus,
aut nequis malus invidere possit,
cum tantum sciat basiorum. |
XLVIII
MELLITOS oculos tuos, Juventi,
siquis me sinat usque basiare,
usque ad milia basiem trecenta,
nec mi umquam videar satur futurus,
non si densior aridis aristis
sit nostrae seges osculationis
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| No. 5
LET US LIVE, my Lesbia*, and let us love.
[* in ancient times, "Lesbian" meant a
well educated and artistic woman, not
a female homosexual.] |
No. 48
YOUR EYES, far sweeter than honey, would
I kiss, Winsome Lad,
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We see our poet was into kissing - big time! The lady is accorded more lines
and more rhapsodic furvor; however, his passion for the mysterious "Lesbia"
[Clodia Pulcher?] differs not one iota from that engendered by the unnamed youth:
"gimme, gimme all the kisses that I cry for / ya know ya got the kisses that I'd die
for; you know you made me ... love you!" [to borrow from Tin-Pan Alley].
One must remember that Catullus was very young, when he wrote
everything; therefore, much of his rank language is not to be taken
literally, but is akin to - say - Marines referring to someone merely annoying
as [...uh] "engaging in incest" [phew!]. Furthermore, from his habit of using nick-names, it's hard to tell if the "Aurelius" along with "Furius"
referred to as "buddies" [comites] in XI/11 are the same Aurelius and Furius thumped but good in XVI/16; or the Aurlius our Poet flays for having designs on his "Ganymede" [XV/15 & XXI/21] and the Furius roasted in XXIII/23. Nor were men the only targets of
his vitrol. "The Red-Haired Hussey" [Rufa] comes in for it in LIX/59. Two short
poems suffice to show Catullus at his most liscivious:
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XVI
PEDICABO ego vos et irrumabo,
Aureli pathice et cinaedi Furi,
qui me ex vesiculis meis putatis,
quod sunt molliculi, parum pudicum.
nam castum esse decet pium poetam
ipsum, versiculos nihil necesset. |
LIX
BONONIENSIS Rufa Rufulum fellat
uxor Menini, saepe quam in sepulcritis
vidistis ipso rapere et rogo cenam,
cum devolutum ex igne prosquens pamem
ab semiraso tunderetur ustore.
|
| No. 16
WHAT, you dare to call my verses "smut,"
Aurelius, you flaming fag, and that screaming
quean Furius? I'll take my **** and shove
it up your *** and down your throats too!
The pious poet must himself be pure;
his verses need not be. |
RUFA OF BONONES gives good h**d to her Rufulus*!
The wife of Meninus can often be found, lurking
among the tombs, snatching morsels of meat
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I can't provide you with a literal translation. AncientSites has a no-obscenities rule (which I assume applies only to English, 'cause it sure
don't apply to Gaius Vallerius)! But, were they for real or just rank humor, like the 14-year-old Mozart's letters to his cousin?
Suffice it to say that the translations in The Loeb Classical Library
are a standing testament to the public prudishness of the Victorian-Edwardian era. Cinaedus is a noun, not an adjective. It
is the actual source of our word "catamite," not "Ganymedes" as usually cited,
but then the Oxonian editors of the Loeb translated "Mentula" as a name,
when it is actually a derogatory word for both the male member and an
an obnoxious man: exactly as the English word ... that rhymes with "stick" [phew!]. (When Krafft-Ebing wrote his monumental Psychopathia Sexualis [in Latin, which was the only language the censors would allow], the teacher
of Freud used Catullus to build his medical vocabulary!)
Prior to the infliction of Judeo-Christian taboos, mores arose from
tradition and the needs of society rather than religious mandates. The Vestals
enjoyed the privileges of senators, including front-row seats at the
munera, where hundreds - sometimes thousands - of men slaughtered
one another to amuse the mob. (When the gladiator combats were finally stopped,
the ones who complained the loudest were the gladiators: their means of
earning a living were being taken away!) Catullus was indeed "lascivious," in
the finest meaning of the word: lusty, full of life, and playful. It seems
obvious to me, he was a manic-depressive. His poems reek of it: odi et amo! He gave voice to his passions, his frustrations, and what a voice
he gave! What was genuine and what was play? That which strikes the open-minded reader as genuine most likely was, and that which strikes one as
play most likely was. We're still the same creatures as the Romans. All that
Christianity has done is to take the fun out of paganism. The heartbreak of
LVIII, where he comes to grips with the fact that his Lesbia is playing the
whore for the fun of it, moves one to tears more than two millennia later. When he soared - and how he soared! - Apollo was in full command.
Like The Dark One, his loves proved disasterous; because he really did love
and not just lust! Lesbia? Certainly! Juventius? Most probably! He
could feel every passion and, what's of prime import, find just the right words
to make us make us also feel! Catullus is the great poet of
EMPATHY. All that we have from him can be traced to
one codex (now lost) in Verona. Do we lament that he did not live longer,
that he left Rome broken-hearted to die in his native city (also that of
Romeo and Juliet)? Don't! Rejoice that he lived at all: the Eternal Puppy,
who moved the great Carl Orff to add tones to his feelings, as Allied bombs
were beginning to pound German cities into rubble. We may say of him, because of him, what he sang to Verianus [IX]:
O quantumst hominum beatorum,
quid me laetius est beatiusve?
 Go back!
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