Juvenal

Roman poet

• Born: c. 60
• Birthplace: Aquinum (now in Italy)
• Died: c. 130
• Place of death: Unknown

Juvenal expanded the dimensions of poetic satire in savage works that lashed out at humankind’s vices and corruption.

Early Life

Juvenal (JEW-vuhn-uhl) was born around 60 c.e. in the small town of Aquinum (now in Italy). It is thought that his family was wealthy and that Juvenal entered the army to make a career in service to the emperor. Unsuccessful in his endeavors to achieve a position of responsibility, however, he turned to literature to establish or simply to express himself. He was a friend of the well-known poet Martial during this period and wrote his first satires against the flatterers and hangers-on in the Imperial court. For this scathing attack, Emperor Domitian confiscated Juvenal’s property and exiled him to Egypt.

Juvenal returned to Rome after the death of Domitian in 96 and wrote, recited, and published his Saturae (100-127 c.e.; Satires, 1693) during the years that followed. Most of the satires written at this time do not refer to contemporary events but to the abuses of the earlier reign of Domitian. For several years, Juvenal was very poor, but eventually his financial problems were alleviated by a gift from Emperor Hadrian.

Life’s Work

Juvenal’s achievement can be found in the five books of satires he produced during his lifetime. There are sixteen satires in the collected works of Juvenal, and the first book contains the first five. These five satires have as their subject matter the corruption and immorality that Juvenal perceived among Roman aristocrats and leaders of his time. He considered that they were interested in wealth and sexual excess rather than the personal virtue and rectitude befitting leaders of the Roman Empire.

The first satire in book 1 is an introduction to the whole work; it is a justification for the literary mode that Juvenal created. There had been satire before Juvenal, but it did not have the tone, subject matter, or structure that Juvenal employed. Earlier satires, such as those of Horace, tended to laugh tolerantly at humankind’s social foibles rather than rage about their vices. The tone set by Juvenal, then, was new:

Must I be listening always, and not pay them back? How they bore me,Authors like Cordus the crude, with the epic he calls the Theseid!

Juvenalian satire is an attack on those who have offended him; its realm is not the heroic but the low and the mean. He directs his hearers to the disgusting Roman scene and declares: “Then it is difficult not to write satire.” He points to such absurdities as a eunuch marrying and Juvenal’s former barber becoming richer than any patrician. Although his satire has the sweep of epic, covering “everything human” from the earliest times, its special province is contemporary life: “When was there ever a time more rich in abundance of vices?”

At the end of the poem, Juvenal brings up the problem of whether he will “dare name names,” meaning real names rather than invented ones. If he does, he is likely to end up “a torch in a tunic” in these corrupt times. He determines therefore to use only the names of the dead and reveal the type of vice, if not the specific example.

The second satire is against not only homosexuality but also the hypocrisy of homosexuals who set themselves up as moral censors of society. The poem opens with a typical Juvenalian hyperbolic exclamation of frustration:

Off to Russia for me, or the Eskimos, hearing these fellowsTalk—what a nerve!—about morals, pretend that their virtueEquals the Curian clan’s, while they act like Bacchanal women.

A list of odious examples follows this opening, the most important being that of Gracchus, a descendant of the republican Gracchi who defended the rights of the Plebeians. This Gracchus has given a large sum of money to a musician and married him in a bizarre ceremony. Once more, the target of Juvenal’s wrath is members of the aristocratic class, who should be offering models for the rest of society instead of pursuing debauchery. Even the great feats of Roman arms are mocked: “An Armenian prince, softer than all of our fairies” ends up in the arms of a Roman tribune, an act that Juvenal calls “the Intercourse Between Nations.”

The third satire, against the city of Rome, is one of Juvenal’s greatest works. The speaker in the poem is not Juvenal but his friend Umbricius. Umbricius is leaving Rome because he is “no good at lying” and therefore cannot possibly survive in Rome. One aspect of Roman life that he finds especially offensive is that the old republican Rome has become a “Greekized Rome,” filled with subtle Greeks who can adapt to any role and thus are displacing the native aristocracy. Another target is the great value now given to wealth; poverty “makes men objects of mirth, ridiculed, humbled, embarrassed.” In addition, Rome is a dangerous place; if its resident does not catch a disease, then he is likely to die in a fire or be killed by a burglar at night. The only sane course is to flee the city and relocate in a country town where civic virtue is still possible and one can live an honorable life.

The fourth satire contains two episodes. In the first, Curly the Cur spends an absurdly large sum of money for a red mullet that he devours by himself. Juvenal remarks that he could have bought the fisherman for less than he paid for the fish. This excess is paralleled by an incident involving Emperor Domitian. Domitian is given a huge turbot because his subjects fear that by purchasing it they would incur the wrath of the “baldheaded tyrant.” There is no pot large enough for the fish, however, and a council of state is called to decide what to do. The councillors are all terrified of saying the wrong thing and ending up dead, so they treat the problem as a question of war. One suggests that the emperor will capture a monarch as great as the fish, while a craftier one suggests that a huge pot to cook the fish whole be created and from henceforward, Great Caesar,/ Let potters follow your camp!” The motion is carried, and the councillors nervously depart. Juvenal adds a comment at the end of the poem to sum up the reign of Domitian: “Nobles he could kill. He was soaked in their blood, and no matter./ But when the common herd began to dread him, he perished.” Once more, the Roman aristocrats are ineffectual or corrupt, and only the mob can bring down a vicious (and here ridiculous) emperor.

The fifth satire satirizes both the proud and overbearing patron and the submissive client who acquiesces to, and even encourages, this situation. The poem is structured as a description of a typical dinner with a patron. The patron drinks the best wines while the client is given wine that would make blotting paper shudder. The patron dines on a choice mullet, the client on an eel that looks like a blacksnake. The reason for such shameful treatment is the client’s poverty; if he were rich, the daintiest morsels would be placed before him. Juvenal suggests to such clients that if they persist in seeking and accepting such treatment, “some day you’ll offer your shaved-off heads to be slapped.” If the client acts like a slave, the patron will surely treat him like a slave.

Book 2 of the Satires is composed of one long poem attacking Roman women; it is the longest and most ambitious of Juvenal’s satires. His charges against women are similar to those he made against Rome’s nobility: They have fallen into decadence, they care only about money, and they have forsaken old ways in favor of current fashions and modes. Women are no longer to be trusted, because so many have poisoned their husbands for wealth or convenience. Finally, even if a man were to find the perfect woman, she would not do because her perfection would be unbearable. It is an amusingly unbalanced, excessive, and effective poem.

The third book is made up of three poems. The subjects are again poverty, nobility, and ways of gaining a livelihood in first century Rome. The poor wretches in satire 7 are poets, historians, and teachers, occupations that had once been honored but are now despised. The poem piles negative example on example, but it does offer some hope for a decent life; “Caesar alone” can provide the help the public refuses to give. The eighth satire contrasts nobility of character with nobility of family; Juvenal cites examples of debased scions from famous families and declares: “Virtue alone is proof of nobility.” The most telling contrast is between the noble heritage of Catiline (Lucius Sergius Catilina), who attempted to enslave the Roman people, and the relative obscurity of Cicero, who thwarted Catiline’s designs and saved the Republic.

The ninth satire has as a speaker, not Juvenal or one of his spokesmen but a homosexual, who is complaining about the difficulties he finds in his work as a prostitute. He is consoled at the end by a cohort who assures him that “there’ll always be fairies/ While these seven hills stand.” Because this is so, he can be content with a contingent of slaves, a villa of his own, and a sum of money equivalent to a thousand dollars—amenities unavailable to most poets of the time.

The highlight of book 4 of the Satires is “The Vanity of Human Wishes,” in which Juvenal poses the question of the proper petitions of humans in their prayers to the gods. He inventories the usual requests that people make—for wealth, beauty, or power—only to find that their attainment produces dangerous results. The wealthy man, for example, has to fear the poison in the jeweled cup, while the poor man is free from such fears. The powerful man has to watch out for envy and hatred, while the weak man can be at peace. Even the desire for a long life is not appropriate, because the man to whom such a request has been granted must face burying his wife, children, and all those dear to him while he withers into a lonely old age. What, then, should people pray for? “A healthy mind in a healthy body, a spirit/ Unafraid of death, but reconciled to it.” The rest must be left to the gods, for human beings do not know their own best interests.

The last book of satires contains only one important poem, “On an Education in Avarice.” It deals not only with the dangers of the desire for great wealth but also with how the example of the parents influences the children. There is a surprising tenderness in Juvenal’s tone when he speaks about the vulnerability of children.

To a child is due the greatest respect: in whateverNastiness you prepare, don’t despise the years of your children,But let your infant son dissuade you from being a sinner.

People should desire only enough to feed, clothe, and shelter themselves; the rest is not only unnecessary but corrupting.

Juvenal’s last book of satires was published in 127. He died shortly after its publication.

Significance

Juvenal’s satires retain their power nearly two thousand years after they were written. Their powerful moral vision and the freshness of their language permit them to transcend the local and specific occasions that they address. Juvenal’s solutions or consolations are not unusual; similar Stoic advice can be found in the writings of Horace or Sextus Propertius. No other poet of the period, however, exposed so much so fully. Some have complained that Juvenal went too far in his condemnation of humankind and that his poetic vision is unbalanced. These critics fail, however, to relate Juvenal’s vision to the social and political systems of the time and to take into consideration the special social role of the satirist in this period. Juvenal believed epic and lyric poetry to be entirely inappropriate forms for a corrupt age. Instead, his time demanded exactly the sort of fiercely agitated satires that he produced.

Bibliography

Duff, J. Wight. A Literary History of Rome in the Silver Age: From Tiberius to Hadrian. 1927. Reprint. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1979. A broad historical survey of the literature of the period, with a specific discussion of satire as a literary form in Juvenal’s time.

Duff, J. Wight. Roman Satire: Its Outlook on Social Life. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1936. Reprint. Hamden, Conn.: Archon Books, 1964. Duff relates Juvenal’s poems to the literary and social contexts, but he does not analyze the poems in any detail. A brief but useful introduction to the poet.

Freudenberg, Kirk. Satires of Rome: Threatening Poses from Lucilius to Juvenal. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001. This study of Roman verse satire highlights the mounting pressure in ancient Rome of Imperial oversight.

Highet, Gilbert. Juvenal the Satirist: A Study. New York: Oxford University Press, 1961. Includes a cogent discussion of each of Juvenal’s satires and of their influence on later literature. The book is very thorough but accessible to the general reader.

Jenkyns, Richard. Three Classical Poets: Sappho, Catullus, Juvenal. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1982. This detailed study of Juvenal’s style and poetic effects brings to light the satirist’s techniques and methods. It is well written, but it is directed toward an academic audience.