The Aesthetics of Darkness: A Study of Hellenistic Romanticism in Apollonius, Lycophron and Nicander 9789042926547, 9042926546

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HELLENISTICA GRONINGANA 17

HELLEN1STICA GRONINGANA MONOGRAPHS

Editorial Board: M.A. Harder R.F. Regtuit G.C. Wakker Advisory Board: K. Gutzwiller, Cincinnati, OH R.L. Hunter, Cambridge A. KOhnken, Mtinster R.F. Thomas, Cambridge, Mass. F. Williams, Belfast 1. 2. 3. 4.

M.A. Harder, R.F. Regtuit, G.C. Wakker, Callimachus, 1993. M.A. Harder, R.F. Regtuit, G.C. Wakker, Theocritus, 1996. M.A. Harder, R.F. Regtuit, G.C. Wakker, Genre in Hellenistic Poel!y, !998. M.A. Harder, R.F. Regtuit, G.C. Wakker, Apollonius Rhodius, 2000. 5. L. Rossi, The Epigrams Ascribed to Theocritus: A Method of Approach, 2001. 6. M.A. Harder, R.F. Regtuit, G.C. Wakker, Hellenistic Epigrams, 2002. 7. M.A. Harder, R.F. Regtuit, G.C. Wakker, Callimachus II, 2004. 8. G. Berkowitz, Semi-Public Narration in Apollonius' Argonautica, 2004. 9. A. Ambiihl, Kinder undjunge Heiden. Innovative Aspekte des Umgangs mit der literarischen Tradition bei Kallimachos, 2005. 10. J.S. Bruss, Hidden Presences. Monuments, Gravesites, and Corpses in Greek Funerary Epigram, 2005. 11. M.A. l{arder, R.F. Regtuit, G.C. Wakker, Beyond the Canon, 2006. 12. E.Prioux,Regards alexandrins. Histoire et theorie des arts dans l'epigramme hellenistique, 2007. 13. M.A. Tueller, Look Who's Talking: Innovations' in Voice and Identity in Hellenistic Epigram, 2008. 14. E. Sistakou, Reconstructing the Epic. Cross~Readings of the Trojan Myth in Hellenistic Poetry, 2008. 15. M.A. Harder, R.F. Regtuit, G.C. Wakker, Nature and Science in Hellenistic Poet,y, 2009. !6. M.A. Harder, R.F. Regtuit, G.C. Wakker, Gods and Religion in Hellenistic Poetry, 2009.

THE AESTHETICS OF DARKNESS A STUDY OF HELLENISTIC ROMANTICISM IN APOLLONIUS, LYCOPHRON AND NICANDER

Evina S!STAKOU

PEETERS LEUVEN -PARIS-WALPOLE,

2012

MA

To Antonios Rengakos teacher and friend

A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. © 2012 - Peeters - Bondgenotenlaan 153 - B-3000 Leuven - Belgium

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any forms or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the holder of the copyright. ISBN 978-90-429-2654-7 D/2012/0602/124

TABLE OF CONTENTS

IX

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

NOTE ........

XI

. CHARTING DARKNESS

1

INTRODUCTION . . . . .

Hellenistic Romanticism? 4 -An un-Callimachean trend 8 From fear to the sublime 15 - The discovery of ugliness 19 The affect of visuality 22 - Romantic darkness 27 - The fantastic mode 29 - The Gothic mood 35 - Grotesque nuances 40 Towards the uncanny 44 -Hellenistic darkness 47

J.

APOLLONIUS ARGONAUT/CA

THE DARKEPIC. . .

I.I. In quest for the fantastic . ........ I.2. The phantoms of Medea ......... I.3. Sites of fantasy, sites of horror . ..... II. LYCOPHRON

. . .

ALEXANDRA

THE DARK TRAGEDY. . . . . . . . . .

JI.I. Alexandra and her demons . IJ.2. Visions of darkness . . . . II.3. The discourse of darkness .

III.

51 53 78 100

131 133 153 173

NICANDER THERlACA AND ALEXlPHARMACA

THE DARK DIDACTIC. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

III.I. The sensation of science . . . . . . . . IIJ.2. Venomous creatures, monstrous plants JII.3. The poisoned body . . . . . . . . . . .

191 193 210 234

HELLENISTIC DARKNESS

AN AFTERWORD BIBLIOGRAPHY

251 265

.

INDEX LOCORUM . GENERAL INDEX

.

287 295

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The first time I ever attempted to read Lycophron's Alexandra, Gothic aesthetics flashed through my mind; the Argonautica of Apollonius Rhodius had already fascinated me with its dark story, characters and settings; and I have always been wondering why Nicander chose to write on such an appalling subject matter as snakes and poisons, until I realized that the aesthetic effect was much more powerful than any actual 'meaning' in his poetry. It occurred to me that these poets, along with Euphorion, Moschus and Parthenius, strike an un-Callimachean tone. Could we probably gain an insight into their aesthetics by reviewing them in the light of European Romanticism? Annette Harder warmly embraced this 'Romantic' reading of Hellenistic poetry in our discussions during the Groningen Workshops. And, upon the completion of The Aesthetics of Darkness, she welcomed (for a second time) the publication of my study in the H ellenistica Groningana series. I am truly grateful for both. Teachers, colleagues and friends contributed in crucial ways to the making of this book. I owe a deep debt of gratitude to Daniel Jakob, not least because he helped me establish the theoretical framework of my study. My mentor, Michalis Kopidakis, pointed out to me some of the most fascinating parallels from Archaic and Classical literature. Richard Hunter has reviewed a great deal of the first draft, and his sharp eye rescued me from factual errors. Heartfelt thanks go to David Konstan, not only for reading through the entire manuscript but first and foremost for his incredible generosity to share his views on aesthetics with me. Y annick Durbec has substantially contributed with bibliography and critical remarks. Floris Overduin facilitated my work by sending me a copy of his dissertation on Nicandrean poetics. I am greatly indebted to Peeters, for once more publishing my book, and especially to Remco Regtuit for helping me throughout the editorial process. Before closing I need to express a special thanks to Antonios Rengakos who has supported and encouraged me during the last 15 years. If he deserves an extra credit on this occasion, it is for fervently believing in the idea of Hellenistic darkness in the first place. As a small token of gratitude I dedicate this book to him.

NOTE

* Greek quotations are always followed by a translation. Translations inserted in the main body of the text as quotations (i.e. without being accompanied by the Greek original) are marked as italics.

* I have used the following translations, with slight modifications, for Apollonius' Argonautica, Lycophron's Alexandra and Nicander's Theriaca and Alexipharmaca: AP0LLONIUSArgonautica: R. Hunter. 1998 [1993]. Apollonius of Rhodes. Jason and the Golden Fleece. Oxford: Oxford University Press. LYC0PHR0NAlexandra: A.W. Mair / G.R. Mair. 1921. Callimachus, Hymns and Epigrams. Lycophron. Aratus. London: Heinemann (with modifications and some alterations after G.W. Mooney. 1988 [1921]. The Alexandra of Lycophron. New Hampshire: Ayer Company, Publishers.) NICANDER Theriaca and Alexipharmaca: A.S.F. Gow/ A.F. Scholfield 1997 [1953]. Nicander. The Poems and Poetical Fragments. London: Bristol Classical Press.

* Unless otherwise noted, translations of brief excerpts from other Greek authors are mine.

CHARTING DARKNESS INTRODUCTION

It lieth, gazing on the midnight sky, Upon the cloudy mountain-peaksupine; Below, far lands are seen tremblingly; Its horrorand its beauty are divine. Upon its lips and eyelids seems to lie Loveliness like a shadow,from which shine, Fiery and lurid, struggling underneath, The agonies of anguish and of death. Yet it is less the horrorthan the grace Which turns the gazer's spirit into stone, Whereon the lineaments of that dead face Are graven, till the charactersbe grown Into itself, and thought no more can trace; 'Tis the melodious hue of beauty thrown Athwart the darkness and the glare of pain, Which humanize and harmonize the strain. Percy Shelley On the Medusa of Leonardo da Vinci (1819)

The blending of eroticism and horror, pleasure and pain, beauty and death, so peculiarly 'Romantic' in its essence, is the subject of the masterly treatise on 19th century European literature by Mario Praz. His 1933 book emphatically entitled The Romantic Agony opens with a chapter on the image of the Medusa-"this glassy-eyed, severed female head, this horrible, fascinating Medusa, that was to be the object of the dark loves of the Romantics and the Decadents throughout the whole of the century" 1-as portrayed by Percy Shelley in his 1819 poem 'On the Medusa of Leonardo da Vinci' 2 • Praz then goes on to summarize the aesthetics behind Shelley's poem as follows: "The discovery of Horror as a source of delight and beauty ended by reacting on men's actual conception of beauty itself: the Horrid, from being a category of the Beautiful, ended by becoming one of its essential elements, and the 'beautifully horrid' passed by insensible degrees into the 'horribly 1. Praz (1970) 26; cf. ibid. pp. 23-52 on the idea that the horrible 'Beauty of the Medusa' epitomizes the notion of Romantic darkness. See also Wilk (2000) 200 who observes that "from the late eighteenth century until the end of the nineteenth, she [i.e. Medusa] was a frequently used symbol of the Romantics, who saw her as the Dark Lady, a manifestation of Death". 2. On Shelley's ekphrasis of Medusa, the questions about viewing terror as posed by the poem, along with its psychoanalytical and political implications, see Jacobs (1985),

Mitchell (1994) 151-181 and Scott (1996).

4

5

THE AESTHETICS OF DARKNESS

CHARTING DARKNESS: lNTRODUCfION

beautiful"' 3• Examples may be easily multiplied, as one thinks of Lord Byron, Mary Shelley, Edgar Allan Poe, Charles Baudelaire, Oscar Wilde. to quote only a few representatives of the Romantic agony. From this perspective, I 8th and 19th century literature may be viewed as an experimentation with the potential of monstrosity, horror, death, or the pas• sions mauvaises, the evil passions of man, to become the source of aes~ thetic pleasure. The present study is largely inspired by this and similai readings of Romantic and Decadent aesthetics, for which I have employed the notion of darkness-though applying it to a quite unexpected target literature, namely Hellenistic poetry. Being aware that attempting such an anachronism verges on the unacceptable, for conventional scholarship at least, I have nevertheless decided to succumb to the allure of the idea itself: that 'Romanticism', stripped off its historical context, shares certain features with the aesthetics of the Hellenistic era; that 'Hellenistic Romanticism' nms counter to Callimachus' aesthetics; that its distinguishing feature is what I have termed darkness; and that at least some Hellenistic authors may be read against the backdrop of this dark aesthetics. But before elaborating on the centre of this study, the notion of darkness, I will roughly sketch out its periphery, the comparison between Romantic and Hellenistic aesthetics.

Viewing ancient literary history from a modern standpoint suggests distinguishing between three main phases from its beginnings until the imperial period, namely the Archaic, the Classical and the Hellenistic. Although this periodization is historically defined (as said, from a modern standpoint), and despite the fact that within each phase there are essential differences as regards the genres, the trends, and the authors themselves, we sense that each one of them corresponds to a particular aesthetics6• The Hellenistic age, broadly defined as an age of artistic innovation and reaction to the literary past-even though the exact proportion of the avantgarde to the traditional in it is still open to dispute-, experienced its own revolution against the 'Classical' (and the 'Classicist', if we thus characterize the imitators of the Classical)'. It is well-known that, after Aristotle had introduced a retrospective view of literature in his Poetics, the Alexandrian scholars compiled the canons, i.e. the lists of 'Classical' authors for each literary genre, thus asserting the meta-Classical character of their epoch8 • Given that from the early Alexandrian era, the poetae docti were acutely aware of their epigonality, we may argue that the Hellenistic aesthetics is a 'Romantic' reaction to canonical viz 'Classical' literature9• But can Romanticism be more accurately defined? Most literary critics would reply in the negative 10• As a vague term deriving from the word romance (a narrative genre of Medieval provenance dealing with a story of adventure and love), Romanticism was initially understood as a turu towards the remote past, and, by extension, as a preference for the bizarre, the imaginary and the magical 11• It is important to note that the Medieval and Renaissance romance evolved as a response to historical epic by emphasizing the fantastic element in storytelling on the one hand, and love on the other 12• There are obvious analogies here with Hellenistic

Hellenistic Romanticism?

The succession of movements in European culture, such as the transition from Medieval to Renaissance aesthetics, or from Neoclassicism to Romanticism, has both a historical and an artistic aspect. One of the stereotypical conceptions of the 'Romantic', inspired by this scheme, is exactly its polarity with the 'Classical', the latter denoting a balance between opposing forces in art and aesthetics, whereas the former suggests the disturbance of this balance4. This polarity is multifaceted-sentimental vs. naive, imagination vs. reason, revolutionarism vs. conservativism, originally creative vs. bound by strict rules, inspiration vs. poetic craftmanship5. Can we project these distinctions onto ancient Greek literature? 3. Praz (1970) 27. 4. That this antithesis is as old as European literature itself (including Greece and Rome) is convincingly argued by Walter Pater in his 1889 essay "On Classical and Romantic" (in Gleckner/Enscoe [1962]). 5. For an overview of this somewhat 'passe' distinction, see Praz (1970) 1~22 and the collected essays of various thinkers (W. Pater, H. Grierson, T. Hulme etc.) in Gleckner/ Enscoe (l 962). That these antithetical notions form the basis of Romanticism, which is viewed as a general tendency towards innovation and modernity, is shown by de Paz (2000) 29-48.

6. On the stereotypes accompanying this periodization, see Hunter (2008b) 10-16. 7. The most recent claim that Hellenistic poetry has developed within the framework of past literature and that there is no "epigonal nostalgia" nor "classicising enthusiasm" in the way Hellenistic poems explored and reconstructed the literary past is found in Fantuzzi/Hunter (2004), esp. pp. vii-viii and lAl. 8. Pfeiffer (1968) e.g. 87-104 records the various phases of this process. 9. According to an older view supported by Wimmel (1965) 63-68, it was a crisis in 4th century poetry that had led to the formation of a new Hellenistic aesthetics; cf. the critical response to this hypothesis by Henrichs (1993). 10. The locus classicus in scholarship is A. Lovejoy's essay "On the Discrimination of Romanticisms" (1924) who, in arguing that "the word 'Romantic' has come to mean so many things that, by itself, it means nothing", denies hypostasis to a general, unified movement of Romanticism; the contrary view of defending 'Romanticism' was taken by R. Wellek in 1949: both essays in Gleckner/Enscoe (1962). 11. See e.g. Roe (2005) and Kucich (2005). 12. The antithesis between epic and romance explains in many ways the emergence of a Romantic mood in literature: on this long-standing question, see Ker (1908).

6

THE AESTHETICS OF DARKNESS

CHARTING DARKNESS: INTRODUCTION

poetics, especially if we consider its archaicizing thematics and tone, the rewriting of myth under the perspective of aitiology (a scholarly version of the penchant for folklore), and the rejection of heroic epic in favour partly of the fairytale-like and partly of the love element 13• Apol!onius of Rhodes in the Argonautica epitomizes these Romantic-age trends, and it is he who is considered to be among the forerunners of the ancient romance 14• Even conceptual modes that prepared the emergence of Romanticism may mutatis mutandis find a parallel in Hellenistic literature. The exploration of time and space became popular during Romanticism, and spawned notions such as exoticism and primitivism; the aesthetics of folk culture came into vogue; new poetic forms evolved as a consequence of an increasing experimentality; psychological issues concerning old age and childhood and the emphasis upon femininity became central topics of literature. Hellenistic literature sets the same trends. Callimachus collects rare local myths in the Aitia, some of which, such as the cults of the heroes, have their roots in folk traditions of the Archaic polis 15• And whereas Apollonius sets his epic within an exotic environment, Theocritus builds his idealized eutopia on the primitivism of a bucolic society 16• Innovation in the creation of new forms, such as the idyll and the epyllion, goes hand in hand with new perspectives in content, as when gods and heroes in childhood and youth are depicted, old-aged and marginal figures come to the fore and women protagonists pave the way for gendered poetics 17•

During the Romantic period the individuality of the author, and not the limitations posed by literary forms, became central for the writing of literature. For Romantic geme theory, mostly developed in Germany by theorists such as the Schlegel brothers, the generic categories of the 'Modems', i.e. not the Classics, are highly individualized ('every poem is a geme for itself'), open to experimentation (even science receives its own poetics) and all-encompassing (modes and moods, different varieties of sensibility and sensation, and aesthetic categories, such as the sublime and the beautiful, exist alongside the traditional forms of epic and novel) 18• Similar developments in Hellenistic geme theory and practice hardly need any documentation 19• As said, striving for individuality is one of the desiderata of the Romantic author; this new notion of the self resides within the development of the idea of imagination. Despite the fact that the reproduction of generic models, the existence of the mythical tradition and the pre-set conditions of composition and performance imposed strict limits upon the individuality of Greek poets of the Archaic and Classical period, Hellenistic poets introduce drastic changes as regards their identity and role 20. The Aitia-Prologue best exemplifies the individuation of the poet in a series of metaphors, the most striking of which is the image of the poet as a child at play (Ait. fr. 1.5-6 Pf.). Further, in the second Aitia fragment, the notion that the poet depends upon divine inspiration collapses under the illusion ofthe dream, thus rendering the powerful archetype of the Muse a cultural phantom 21• Whereas the examples of poetic individuality may easily be multiplied, Hellenistic imagination is more difficult to define. In my opinion, the handling of myth conveys more than anything the essence of Hellenistic imagination. Greek myth, a cultural phenomenon reflecting collective identities and values, has undergone radical alterations during the Hellenistic period. It is not only the collection of local, virtually

13. For these axioms of Hellenistic scholarship, see e.g. Kambylis (1965), ReinschWerner (1976), Fuhrer (1992), and the more recent approaches by Fantuzzi/Hunter (2004) 42-88, Hunter (2005) and Monison (2007); cf. Loehr (1996) for an overview of GraecoRoman aitiology. On the significance of love in Hellenistic literature, see the thorough analysis by Rohde (1960) 12-177; eroticism as an aesthetic ideal of Alexandrianism is explored by Papanghelis (1994) 58-82. 14. The idea was first developed in the rather neglected treatise on the ancient romance by Heisennan (1977) but became a commonplace of Hellenistic scholarship only after Beye (1982) 71-76; cf. for more details below p. 48 and n. 157. 15. On the incorporation of folk elements into the Aitia, see Swiderek (1952-1953). For a historical approach to the Hellenistic predilection for local myths of the past, see Scheer (2003). 16. On Theocritus' bucolic sensibility, see Bonelli (1979) 26-43; folk elements have been stressed by Horowski (1973); the connection of bucolic and/or pastoral with European Romanticism is a long-standing problem of scholarship, see e.g. Halperin (1983) and Kegel-Brinkgreve (1990). Recent approaches in Fantuzzi/Papanghelis (2006), esp. by Gutzwiller (pp. 1-23), Bemsdorff (pp. 167-207) and Fantuzzi (pp. 235-262). 17. The Hellenistic sensibility concerning childhood and youth is explored by Ambilhl (2005), whereas the orientation towards old age and femininity has not received systematic attention; on Hekale as a symbol of the old-aged hero, see McNelis (2003) and Ambi.ihl (2004); on women in Hellenistic literature, see Gutzwiller (2007) 195-199 with a short bibliographical note on p. 237.

7

18. On a thorough analysis of (German) genre theory during Romanticism, see Rajan (2000). . 19. Cf. the term Kreuzung der Gattungen coined by Wilhelm Kroll in the 1920s, and the recent overview of the problem by Rossi (2000). On the transformations of the genre during the Hellenistic era, see Fantozzi/Hunter (2004) 17-26. 20. Gelzer (1993) and Parsons (1993) sketch out the changes in the poets' identities during the Hellenistic period, although they are reluctant to acknowledge a high degree of individuality in them; cf. the objections raised by Hemichs (1993). From another viewpoint, we may argue that Hellenistic scholars invented the idea of poetic imagination, rendered as poetic licence (1tOtrJnKi] E~oucria) in the Homeric scholia, see Meijering (1987) 62-67. 21. The juxtaposition of the invocation to the Muses with the literary models evoked by Callimachus is explored by Fantuzzi/Hunter (2004) 1-17.

8

nm AESTHETICS

OF DARKNESS

unknown myths from the remote past of the Archaic po/is that changed it. Hellenistic poets gain control over the myth by exploring its susceptibility to fiction by either devising minor episodes within the broader tradition of Greek myth or inventing an entirely new mythology 22 • The former reaches its climax with the quasi-mythological stories of Parthenius23, the latter with the bucolic mythology of Theocritus 24 • As for the µuOos, the rcpiil;is articulated as a coherent plot, it becomes extinct 25 ; in some genres, such as didactic poetry, artistic imagination explores the poeticization of any type of non-mythical, prosaic material. Hellenistic culture marks a break with everything 'Classical' and is, at the same time, a creative reworking of it. Despite being limited by the conventions of their literary system, the Hellenistic literati turned the spotlight on imagination and individuality as no Greek poets had done before. Yet, I do not suggest here that some Hellenistic poets were Romantics avant la lettre. My claim is simply that numerous peculiarities of Hellenistic aesthetics which are non-Classical in quality show an affinity with some aspects of Romanticism 26 • But, does this assumption, and especially the penchant for dark aesthetics, apply to each and every poet active during the last three centuries BC? Definitely not. And the most obvious exception is the leading figure of the Alexandrian avantgarde, Callimachus.

An un-Callimachean trend To understand how Callimachus' poetic universe is constituted, one has to have recourse to the notion of aesthetic distance. This is particularly true of the Aitia, whose novel-like narratives, anchored in the distant 22. Hellenistic poets herald the liberation of the imagination (as the Romantic poets did) on the basis of the revision of myth, see Radke (2007). 23. Fictionality in these cases does not amount to pure invention, since these stories derive as a rule from previous collections of myths or local histories; however, their conforming with stereotypical plot-types and set patterns and their novelistic features relate them to the precursors of novel, see Lightfoot (1999) 256-263. 24. Recognized as the first fully fictional wOrld in literature by Payne (2007); cf. Fantuzzi (2000) on the demythologizing of poetry in Theocritus. 25. Callimachus' axiom of oUx Ev Ustcrµa Otl)VCKi:i;with all its possible manifestations in Hellenistic poetry-the catalogue form, the framing of the narrative, the lack or discontinuity of plot-bears some similarity with the Romantic ideal of 'fragmentation' as described in the 'Preface' to Coleridge's Kubla Khan, see Sistakou (2009a); on the Romantic fascination with the fragment, see Thomas (2005). 26. Nineteenth century scholarship viewed Alexandrian literature through a Romantic prism, especially Erwin Rohde and Auguste Couat; for a fascinating overview of these trends in Hellenistic scholarship, see Ffeiffer (1955).

CHARTING DARKNESS: INTRODUCTION

9

past, in a world of heroes and gods, are either mediated by the framework, a dramatized dialogue between the Muses and the scholarly persona of the narrator (Books 1-2), or filtered through the repeated references to authoritative sources, such as gods, historians or scientists (Books 3-4)27 • This anti-emotional stance has been thus described 28 : Judging by the extant fragments, the stories told in the Aitia offered considerable potential for the exploration of dramatic anguish and romantic yearning, and it is characteristic of Callirnachus, and of the elitist tradition whose spokesman he was, that he studiously avoided this exploration. Vulgar emotions were among the 'common things' which he loathed.

Callimachus' readers are constantly made aware that the narrator, firstperson, dramatized or omniscient, whether in the Aitia, the Hymns or the Hekale, views his literary world through the lens of the scholar and the commentator. Part and parcel of this distanced, often ironic, perspective is the avoidance of rhetorical excess. Callimachus never carries his expression to extremes nor does he resort to expressionist style 29 • An obvious reason may be Callimachus' quest for brevity and accuracy-a plausible explanation of Asm6s if taken to denote the aesthetic quality of poetic discourse. Iluz6s, the opposite of Asm6s, has been interpreted as an attack on the 'excessively ornamented, over-detailed, florid' and/or 'rough' style, mainly in reference to the poetry of Antimachus 30 • When the AitiaPrologue contrasts poetic slenderness with the thunder of Zeus, it is the bombastic style and the affective experience it creates that are criticized (Ait. fr.l.19-20 Pf.) 31 • The closure of the Hymn to Apollo may be read along the same lines, if the juxtaposition of 'Acrcropioo rco,uµofo µeyus p6os with 0Aiy11AtPus liKpov aonov is analyzed in terms of the antith27. Although the Aitia explore the entire cosmos (the human existence, the divine and the notion of time), there is a constant juxtaposition of serious with humorous tones, a play between the narrator and the characters, a sense of fragmentation and distancing; this reading of the Aitia, put forward by Hutchinson (2003), is best expressed by the following phrase (p. 51): "The Aitia, like the Argonautica, sweeps across the whole range of the Greek world; but its narrator is a static and intellectual figure". On the complex narrative structure of Aitia 1-2, see Harder (1988). 28. By Pollitt (1986) 14. 29, Fantozzi/Hunter (2004) 44 rightly point out "the lack of obvious verbal adornment", "the spareness of style", "the sense of control", "the elimination of excess" and the "severe poetic discretion" of Callimachus' style. 30. This interpretation of naxUi; is suggested by Krevans (1993) 156-160. 31. Cf, Propertius' imitation of the passage (2.1.39~40): sed neque Phlegraeos lovis Enceladique tumultusl intonet angusto pectore Callimachus. For the thunder of Zeus as a stylistic metaphor and the identification of 'Zeus' with Homer or Aeschylus (in the Aristophanic context at least), see Asper (1997) 196~198; it is seen as a metaphor of 'stylistic grandeur' by Petrovic (2006).

10

11

THE AESTHETICS OF DARKNESS

CHARTING DARKNESS: INTRODUCTION

esis between the low quality of uncontrollable expression on the one hand and the elegance of highly selective phrasing on the other. To further illustrate the point that Callimacheanism should be understood, among other things, as an exercise in formalistic discipline and well-balanced discourse 32 , it is worth emphasizing the aesthetic divide between Callimachus and, say, Apollonius by an example. The episode in which the Argonauts are plunged into darkness while sailing the Aegean and are eventually rescued by the epiphany of Apollo near the island of Anaphe is treated both in the Aitia and Book 4 of the Argonautica. The comparison between the two passages highlights the distance between Callimachean and Apollonian aesthetics. I will only quote here the verses focusing on the moment of crisis:

of 'smoky'; his controlled expression becomes evident in the laconic description of both the feelings of the Argonauts and the plight they are in. Conversely, Apollonius overemphasizes darkness by alluding both to the primordial Chaos and the underground night of Hades 34 , two images that combine unearthly grandeur with terror, and explicitly stresses the agony of the heroes: thus, the scene triggers the affective rather than the intellectual response of the reader". As a moment of pathos this dark story from the Argonaut myth does not sit well within the larger context of Callimachean thematics. Callimachus is not attracted by the morbid; he expressly rejects it when he scornfully refers to the image of the crane that revels in the blood of the Pygmies in the Aitia-Prologue (Ait. fr. 1.13-14 Pf.) 36 • However, there are passages suggesting that rhetorical and thematic hyperboles may be at work in Callimachus too. An obvious example is the Hymn to Delos: battles between gods and struggles of natural forces are set against the backdrop of the powerful personification of geographical locations-personification being one of the vital components of the sublime 37• But, the embedding of the plot into the hymnic frame and the intertextual play with recognizable scenes from Homer, Hesiod and tragedy, a play that often verges on parody, dulls the emotional effect of the hymn. Much more explicit is the way in which Callimachus treats the dark myth of Erysichthon as a black comedy in highlighting its repercussions for family and social environment rather than its macabre details-not to mention the deliberate elimination of the autophagy ending of the story38• It is not only the tone but also the subject matter that reflect Callimachean vs. Romantic aesthetics. For instance, one favourite scenario of Hellenistic poetry, the catasterism, presents ample opportunity for the

Ait. fr. 250.8-11 SH and fr. 18.5-8 Pf. When Tiphys knew not ... how to steer ... Nonacrinian Callisto, unbathed in the streams of Ocean ... they were afraid ... but the son of Aison, full of grief, raised his hands to you, Hiiios, and swore many an offering to Pytho, many to Ortygia, if you would drive the swirling darkness from the ship ... [Trans!.F. Nisetich] Arg. 4.1694-1705 Suddenly, however, as they raced over the great expanse of the Cretan sea they were terrified by the darkness which men call katoulas ( =deadly or enshrouding); no stars penetrated the deadly darkness, no beams of the moon; down from the heavens Jpread a black emptiness, or it was some other gloom rising up from the furthest depths. They had no idea whether they were moving in Hades or over the waters. They handed over their hopes of return to the power of the sea, helpless to control where it might lead them. Jason, however, raised up his hands and in a loud voice called upon Phoibos, summoning him to save them. In his despair tears flowed down; countless were the offerings he promised to provide, many at Pytho, many at Amyklai, many to Ortygia. [Transl. R.

Hunter] Although a minute sample (and an uncertain one, since the Callimachean text is preserved in broken bits), it is representative in that it reflects the ip.tel!ectual vs. the emotional style 33• Callimachus insists on scholarly details-the mythological digression on the constellation Ursa Major, the cult epithet of Apollo 'IiJtosand the atµbivalent Homeric glossa uµix0u1"6sts, to which he obviously attributes the lesser known interpretation 32. The essence of Callimachus' self-restraint and the way he exploits what Ezra Pound describes as 'logopoeia' (i.e. the ironies resulting from the dynamic relation between verbal expression, usage and poetic context) are brilliantly captured by Papan,. ghe!is (1994) 89-91. 33. This may correspond to the different generic conventions of elegy and epic, compactness in narrative vs. completeness in treatment respectively, cf. Harder (2002) 218223.

34. For thorough discussion of Apollonius' imagery, see Vian (1993) 207. Livrea (1987) 189-190 offers an interesting analysis of the passage by reference to the 'ErebosAspekt des Meeres' as studied by Wachsmuth. 35. Conte (2007) 49-57 may be correct when he makes a fine distinction between Apollonius' sympatheia, which he calls "the affective and psychological colouring typical of Alexandrian and neoteric poetry", and Virgil's empatheia, a feature penneating the entire narrative and enhancing its tragic pathos. We should not confuse the emotional involvement of the reader of a 'grand' epic, such as Homer or even Virgil, with the sophisticated exploitation of affect by Apollonius and other Hellenistic Romantics; on this point, see Fantuzzi/Hunter (2004) 98~104. 36. Asper (1997) 199-207. 37. In this hymn Callimachus exploits the supranormal, see Williams (1993); on the fairytale aspects of Callimachus' hymns, see Gigante Lanzara (1995). On personification and the sublime, see Knapp (1985). 38. Ovid (Met. 7.738~878) does not omit any of the tale's macabre details; for Ovid's rhetorical exaggeration in the treatment of Erysichthon, see Griffin (1986). On the comic elements in Callimachus' narration of the myth of Erysichthon, see McKay (1962).

12

13

THE AESTHETICS OF DARKNESS

CHARTING DARKNESS: INTRODUCTION

poet to shed light on the dark side of metamorphosis thematics: namely the dramatic incidents, usually unrequited love or hubristic behaviour, which result in the transformation of the unfortunate hero(ine) into a different entity. Instead, Callimachus in the Lock of Berenike reverses the natural order of the events, since the metamorphosis of the queen's lock of hair has been materialized before the beginning of the elegy; thereupon, the scholarly narrator wittily captures (and at the same time undermines) the 'Romantic' soliloquy of the catasterized lock 39 • But it is not only the distanced perspective that renders Cal!imachus' elegy so restrained in its emotionality. The crucial factor is the lack of dark aspects in the hard-luck story which, however, is dramatically narrated by the lock-the most violent action being the cutting off of the lock from the queen's hair with iron and steel (Ail. fr. 110.47-50 Pf.)! This mixture of un-tragic subject matter and melodramatic tone, almost a parody of metamorphosis literature, stands in stark contrast with another catasterism myth as recounted by a contemporary of Callimachus, Eratosthenes of Cyrene, in his famous elegy Erigone (and in his prose collection of Catasterisms). Although we are unable to reconstruct the elegy with any degree of certainty, its synopsis reflects a taste for 'blood and death' thematics: after the Attic hero, and a follower of Dionysus, Ikarios, is killed by intoxicated farmers, his daughter Erigone, upon finding her father's dead body, hangs herself from a tree; the god punishes the Athenians by causing mass suicides among unmarried girls; at the end, Ikarios, Erigone and her dog Maira are transformed into stars 40 • According to the title the emphasis of the poem must have been placed on the heroine 41 • Unfortunate heroines like Erigone are the unwritten rule in the poetry of the Alexandrian avant-garde, but here again there is a world

of difference between Callimachus and other Hellenistic poets. Callimachus' sole poem dedicated to a feminine figure, the Hekale 42 , tells the story of a woman who, motivated by her strong maternal instinct, offers hospitality to Theseus and then dies peacefully from old age. If the ancient scholion informing us that the I-Iekale was intended as a response to the µsya 1wi11µa is correct (Sch. 'I' H. Ap. 106), then it might reflect Callimachus' dislike for certain poetic vogues of his era rather than merely his rejection of long-scale poetry. Callirnachus may be reacting against the extravagance, in both content and style, of exactly this type of poetry-and its pretence at being serious and dignified. Although this line of reasoning is purely speculative, it seems that the µzya?c11yovtj, as used in the context of the Aitia-Prologue with reference to Mimnermus' Nanna (fr. I. 1112 Pf.), suggests a kind of love poetry developed around a feminine figure with an emphasis on the sentimental and the dramatic. A supportive argument would be that the Nanna served as a model for Antimachus' Lyde, which is dismissed by Callirnachus as a icaxu yp&µµa (fr. 398 Pf.) 43 • The passionate tone of both poems is admired by Posidippus in his poetological-amatory epigram (AP. 12.168.1) Navvofi,; Kai Auo11,; rlic(xzi Mo ... Hermesianax in bis own Leontion attests the erotic fire of Mimnermus for Narmo (fr. 7 .37 CA) and, more importantly, projects the melodramatic plot and style of the Lyde onto Antimachus' biography (fr. 7.41-46 CA=Antimachus test. 11 Matthews): Auofis Ii' 'Av,iµaxos Auoriioos eKµtv eponos 1tAT)yeisllaK