The First Epistle of the Second Book of Horace Imitated

The First Epistle of the Second Book of Horace Imitated Living and writing in an era in which culture was flourishing and poetry was not simply a pastime[1], must have been a dream to Alexander Pope: such was the Augustan age in Latin literature (27 BC AD 14), which under the reign of the emperor Augustus provided not only for a serene social environment for the thriving of liberal arts, but also concerned about its good management by the close advisor Maecenas, responsible of the patronage of the artistic talent. In this sort of literary scene, poets such as Horace, Ovid, Virgil and Livy found their mastery being appreciated, highlighted and celebrated. Approaching the two historical periods with a thorough close analysis, its remarkable how Popes England and the Roman Empire were sharing aspects of their social life: the division between Court and Country as existed in the Augustan Rome was common view in England as the difference between luxury and philosophical retreat. A literary analogy, specifically relevant for Popes works, could also be detected, but in terms of cultural and social satisfaction, unfortunately, the 18th Century poet faced a reality which of Augustan had nothing but the name. The so called Augustan poetry rose during the first half of 1700 with the explicit intention of being satirical and political, meant to criticise and hit the government, whose enmity and hatred towards all poetry and the arts were concentrated in the figure of the contemporary ruling George II. Ascended to power in 1683, the monarch showed a non-caring and contrasting attitude towards every literary manifestation, often stating himself in favour of censorship that made poets voices and endavours even much harder to be heard and adequately esteemed. Moreover, the spreading corruption was detestated by the writers of the time, and by Pope in particular, who in 1737 came into closer association with the Opposition, expressing his role as an active political poet. Funnily, George II was also christened Augustus, coincidence that considerably remarked the difference between the two princes: Alexander Pope didnt think twice about taking advantage of this perfect homonymy and under the clever suggestion of his friend Lord Bolingbroke, he created a brilliant and enjoyable satirical collection: Imitations of Horace (1738). Firstly, what an imitation is must be clarified: not a fake, something not genuine should be thought about, but the Latin sense of imitatio should be taken into consideration, in which the idea of re-creation and re-interpretation is implied. Secondly, the choice of Horace must be explained: not only he was on the defensive of writing satire, as Pope was towards his literary environment, but also gave him the chance to rise questions and social problems besides giving judgments of contemporary literature and taste. These issues found their place in the mock-epic poem The first Epistle of the Second Book of Horace Imitated (May 1737), which also best underlines Popes contempt for George II, making of it a parodic effective thread over the poem. The Horatian Epistle opens with compliments sincerely paid by Horace to Augustus, while the ones claimed in Popes version are to be constructed ironically: the English Patron of Mankind in line 1 had nothing to do with the Horatian Caesar in line 4. The word caesar was not meant just to address Augustus with his second name: it is an important honorific that stands for the recognised authority and greatness of a leader, who could bear alone all the government and social duties, worth following with trust. The contrast between the two Augustuses is here even more highlighted and as the English courtier Lord John Hervey defines it, it is a very material difference [à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦] For as personal courage was the only quality necessary to form a great prince which the one was suspected to want, so I fear it was the only one the other was ever thought to possess. (p. 261, Memoirs). The game of the parallel ironic and glorific tone plays constantly throughout the poem: such a Wonder of Kings! Like whom, to mortal eyes | None eer has risen, and none eer shall rise (line 29-30) becomes some monster of a King in line 210 and is still contraposed to the indisputable maiestas (line 258) of the Roman Augustus, or his greatness. This political complaint then is strictly connected with and leads the way to the real Epistles social concern. To start with, more than everything, Augustans of both ages were worried about their literary heritage and how they should have dealt with it. People and poets were happy and accostumed to praise primitives such as Shakespeare and Ennius, but a common sense of lacking of art of them was hanging in the air and foreign literature started being attractive after having conquered France in one case and Greece in the other. Horace could still see the sapiens et fortisEnnius (line 50) and his ingenium, the mastery he had demonstrated, as Pope would agree about Shakespeares immortality but another good way of doing literature was emerging and couldnt wait to be noticed. If Time improve our Wit as well as Wine, | Say at what age a Poet grows divine? (Pope, lines 49-50). Poets were scared of how much time might have taken for their works to be valued if people had remained stuck to the past for longer. For that, it was important not to leave the public be the judge in order to make sure the distance between the new and the old, veteros and novos (Horace, lines 37-38), was respected and here the social context starts to shape. When the poets write about the public and their feelings towards it, there is where the two societies begin to clush and be really interactive. On more scientific basis, this connection is interestingly defined as time-space distanciation in The Dictionary of Human Geography, 4th Edition, for which Anthony Giddens, British sociologist, describes the stretching of social systems across time and space. Historically, The nexus of relations political, economic, military in which a society exists with others is usually integral to the very nature of that society[2]: thus to maintain this interaction, which is intrinsic to society itself, so called technically symbolic tokens are implied, as media of exchange which have standard value and thus are interchangeable across a plurality of contexts (Modernity and Self-Identity, 1991). Put in context, these stretching and media of exchange seem fundamental in order to read in parallel Horaces and Popes societies. With the concept of time-space distanciation in mind, its easier to jump flexibly from one time to the other, from Rome to England and follow the thread that society weaves across the lines of the Epistle. Back to the relationship with the public, both poets are trying to warn about the misunderstanding of contemporary literature: Pope assumes an explicit rude and insulting tone while declaring that the public is nothing but a fool (lines 93-94), while on his side, Horace takes a softer and much more diplomatic position by claiming that not always the public sees and interprets things in the right way and its now mistaken in believing that no poetry can match the old school but that in this case Iove iudicat aequo (God judges righteously, line 68). However, the Latin text suggests a different shade of what Horaces consideration of the public was: he addresses the audience as volgus (line 63), which does not only refer to people in general but has to be read with a negative and offensive connotation that is effective on a class-based society, in which the mass was considered inferior and with scorn. The argue about the public goes on in lines 115-118 in Popes imitation: I lose my patience, and I own it too, | When works are censurd, not as bad, but new; | While if our Elders break all Reasons laws, | These fools demand not Pardon, but Applause. Fools that have no taste, a crowd that has no interest in welcoming the novitas, the novelty in literature (line 90, Horace) and still pays honorem et premia (honours and praises, line 78) only to the ancients: Pope was clearly complaining about the audience but at the same time denouncing the ruling power and censorship that was affecting the literary environment. Even the writers profession seemed to be undermined, as for Indocti doctique (educated people and not, line 117) for Horace and those who cannot write, and those who can for Pope, All ryme, and scrawl, and scribble, to a man (lines 187-188). Unskilled writers were emerging and the public was enjoying them with incertos oculos et gaudia vana (line 188, Horace). The choice of the adjective incertos (uncertain) for the eyes (oculos) is interesting, as it doesnt only refer to the dubious taste of the public but also to a sort of inner ignorance that caused confusion and inability to judge, as if the public itself was unskilled. That might simply remark the mistrust and disdain for the audience in Horace but in Pope it assumes again a political connotation, in which the unskilled writer is just taken as a pretext and metaphor to criticise the unprofessional and unskilled George II. The poem is so constantly balanced on the coexistence of political and social context. They create the wire on which the reader keeps his equilibrium within the two Augustan societies, each of them narrated and sung by their poets with similar yet so different connotations; in fact, their opinions about the literary taste converge in all their aspects but their perceptions of the possibility of dealing with power for it, differ. In this divergence lies the key point and crucial concept to change and light up the whole interpretation of the text and of the poets themselves. As previously mentioned, Horace was writing for and of Augustus, whom he could trust and relate to besides his audience: whether the latter failed, the prince was still a solid pillar waiting for his courtiers words. On the other hand, Pope had no one to rely on: the publics senseless and George II taken of any consideration. In this light, the Epistle takes the shape and significance of a social poem in which Horace is the image of that kind of society Pope wishes to live in and write for: Horace becomes the means by which Pope wants to raise his voice and at the same time he makes him part of the society itself. More than a simple report of power misbehaviour hides behind the lines of the Epistle: Pope puts in it his frustration and will, his anger and wish that a society of Horatian type could still be possible and viable and while this anger falls into satiric tones, he constructs on it an entire poem. The ideal of Horace and his actual figure help Pope in bringing his age and society to life and as he states in the Advertisement to The First Satire of the Second Book of Horace Imitated, an answer from Horace was both more full, and of more Dignity, than any I coud have made in my own person. In the last part of the Epistle, the presence of the poets becomes expressively strong. Standing in front of Poetry, Horace keeps his humble tone by declaring once again his scribendi studio (passion for writing, line 108) only aimed at celebrating Augustus maiestas; he would blush, in fact, at a great tribute to him alone, departed from his patron. On his side, Pope sticks to that aggressivity that just conceals insecurity and finally reveals the real parodic biting[3] intention of the Encomium. In the final lines he delineates a self-portrait, adjusting and immerging himself among the Georgian England, society for whom he felt the need to call for Pen and Ink[4]. BIBLIOGRAPHY Pope, Alexander, Imitations of Horace, ed. by John Butt, Methuens English Classics, 1966 Horace, Liber Secundus, Epistula I in Horatii Epistularum in Q. Horatius Flaccus, rec. J.G. Orellius, (Editionem Minorem Sextam post Io. Georgium Baiterum curavit Guilelmus Hirschfelder, Volumen Prius, ed. by Berolini, 1882), p. 400-436 Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia in Internet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Pope https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustan_poetry LeedsWIKI, Virgil, Horace and Ovid: The Politics behind the Poetry https://wiki.leeds.ac.uk/index.php/Virgil,_Horace_and_Ovid:_The_Politics_behind_the_Poetry The Dictionary of Human Geography, ed. by R.J. Johnston, Derek Gregory, Geraldine Pratt and Micheal Watts, (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 4th Edition, 2000), pp. 837-838 [1] Virgil, Horace and Ovid: The Politics behind the Poetry, LeedsWIKI https://wiki.leeds.ac.uk/index.php/Virgil,_Horace_and_Ovid:_The_Politics_behind_the_Poetry. [2] A Contemporary Critique of Historical Materialism, 2nd edn (Stanford University Press, Stanford, California, 1995), p. 91. [3] That when I am at praise, they say I bite., line 409. [4] Line 180.

Women are responsible for the vast majority of childcare in contemporary Britain

Women are responsible for childcare for a variety of reasons. Often due to the costs of private childcare, a mother staying at home becomes logical. Many women struggle to find convenient well paid jobs so conclude that it is not worth working. Another reason why the woman is often responsible may be that the family see it as only natural that the woman in the family should take care of the children. â€Å"Women are perceived as having the sort of emotional qualities necessary to nurture families and run the home† (Valentine, 2001, pg 65). Also, maternal instincts are often assumed to grant women with greater ability than men when it comes to childcare. â€Å"Eco-feminists†¦ see child-raring as a key experience that teaches women to be more caring and tender† (Rose, 1996, pg. 26). Finally, single mothers are often left with little or no choice than to raise their child alone and rely on childcare benefits provided by the state. â€Å"In the UK and North America at least, domestic work (housework and childcare for example) within the heterosexual family has often been assigned to women. (Holloway and Hubbard, 2001, pg 91). For these reasons and many others women are often the sex ‘left holding the baby'. This report will look at how this can affect a woman's use of space, and how the negative side of this can be changed. When a woman has no outside work, her domestic restraints can make her see her home as a prison. Mothers at home with babies crave for interactions with other adults and for time away from their home dwelling. This is where their home is no longer a place of comfort and rest but a place of domestic labour. Therefore, the structure of the nuclear family can lead to the home becoming a prison. â€Å"A key observation here is that the separation of home from work cannot apply when the work of one member of the household occurs in the home place. † (Holloway and Hubbard, 2001, pg 91). Leading a more domestically influenced life can change the behaviour of a person. Ardener claims â€Å"Behaviour and space are mutually dependent† (Rose, 1996, pg 17). Mothers working full or part time often find it hard to find a job that will accommodate their needs. Those women, who do work, work in low paid jobs within close proximity to their homes. Daily activity patterns are structured by the constraints on mobility presented by the presence of young children and the lack of access to the car. † (Gregson et al. , 1997, pg 69) In society, we are surrounded by labels. A mother, for example, has the labels such as, mother, wife, daughter, sister, friend, aunt, customer, co worker, to name just a few. As we conform to what is expected of us from each of these labels our use of space can alter dramatically. A mother thinks about what is best for her child. Certain places will automatically become off limits for her as she puts the needs of her child first. For example one place the mother would not go includes smoky public houses. â€Å"The employment possibilities, the kinds of unpaid activities undertaken and the daily activities of young women†¦ [With children] are defined within the ‘social constraints' imposed by the ideology of gender roles† (Gregson et al. , 1997, pg 69) In order to confirm that a woman's use of space is altered by childcare, mind maps can be produced and analyzed. This technique can show how well a person does or does not know an area. Certain areas would be in less detail that they view as unsafe to take children, such as subways or public houses. Other areas would be in great detail such as school routes, parks and play areas. A woman involved in childcare's use of space was first altered during industrialisation, when production moved from the home into factories. The home was no longer a work place for all the family but just for one. â€Å"Whereas before, cooking childcare cleaning and so on had been done on a collective basis, the communal style of living broke down and families became emotionally and physically more enclosed or privatized. The definition of ‘home' as a place separate from employment devalued the unpaid work done within it, precisely because it was not paid. † (Valentine, 2001, pg 66). Being a full time carer for your own or someone else's children can be a lonely experience. Children are unable to hold the intelligent level of conversation that a woman will crave. McDowell, 1999, explains how housework can be in worse conditions than paid work. It is an isolating experience and that it should be recognised for the amount of character and hard work that it requires. It is even harder for a woman whose family has been out all day at school and work, while she has done the unpaid work of the house, for love, not money. â€Å"The very large majority of men work away from their homes and return there for rest and recreation†¦ For Fathers and children alike these hours away from home bring new contacts, recreation such as clubs camps and games, as well as more serious interests. But in general the mother stays at home. † (Spring Rice, cited in McDowell, 1999, Pg 74) Following the Second World War, the nuclear family took priority in house building. This was in hope of regaining, â€Å"The sanctity of family life†. Valentine, 2001, pg 66). The designers and governments wanted to encourage this style of housing following the war because, â€Å"They were concerned about falling birth rates and argued that improved housing would persuade more women to have children and remove the temptation of outside work†. (Valentine, 2001, pg 66). As history tells, it did not work out this way. Women have fought their way to better maternity rights so that child bearing does not mean they do not pursue a career or outside interests. Despite this, the nuclear house is still popular on the market with a rise of single apartments.

Mark Twain Short Stories Essay

Samuel Langhorne Clemens, better known by his pen name of Mark Twain, is a widely renowned author whom, throughout his life, wrote countless short stories and essays criticizing politics, media, and other government and social areas. Twain was an avid supporter of civil rights and was extremely critical of the court systems. Twain often criticized how society treatment of criminals changes for every social class. Mark Twain uses his dark humor and irony to convey said theme in three of his more popular short stories, The New Crime, Running for Governor, and A Presidential Candidate. Mark Twain’s short story, The New Crime, illustrates the positive side of having a high social class and the special treatment from the court systems that comes along with wealth. Twain first writes about a series of ordinary murder cases committed by wealthy men and lords in which the murderers are all pardoned from their crimes and giving the insanity plea. The insanity plea basically states that if a person is mentally insane, they cannot be held accountable for any crimes they commit while insane. All of the murders from said cases are ordinary murders, which show no sign of insanity. This clearly displays that the men are only acquitted because of their deep pockets. One of Twain’s favorite literary devices is irony and he often uses it to ridicule the government. In The New Crime Twain uses irony when he writes, â€Å"The servant girl, Bridget Durgin, at the dead of night invaded her mistress’ bedroom and carved the lady literally to pieces with a knife. Then she dragged the body to the middle of the floor and beat and Lemacks 2 banged it with chairs and such things. †¦No such insanity plea was offered in her defense. † (Twain 5) This is ironic because, in Durgin’s case, she is obviously deranged but, since she is of low social standard, she is not offered the insanity plea and, instead, is promptly hanged. The reader knows that Twain is purposefully being ironic because he includes details such as the facts that she has no motive for the murder, saves the woman’s baby, and continues to hike through the snow with the child having left her shoes, which all show how clearly insane the girl is. In using his precious irony, Twain makes his point very clear and makes sure to drive the message of the judicial systems corruptness through to the reader. In Twain’s short story, Running for Governor, he writes about when he was nominated for governor of New York. He uses said story to show the negative side of having a high social status and how the media will treat one differently when they are put in the spotlight. Twain himself is the main character and has never done a single thing in all his life to be ashamed of. When his campaign begins, Twain feels that his advantage over his competition is that he possesses good character whereas, Twain’s two opponents are portrayed in the papers as terrible men. The next day newspapers start to come out accusing Mr. Twain of ridiculous crimes. One of the papers says that Twain has been convicted of perjury by thirty-four witnesses against a native woman in Cochin China! Twain is list all of the absurd accusations in the following pages. What Twain is doing is making the charges serious, such as murder, but also incredibly odd. The reason being to create a subtle, dark humor in all of the newspaper articles so that the reader will see how the media is clearly just making up stories about whomever runs for a political office. Twain uses this same technique in his short story, A Presidential Candidate, in which he jokingly writes that he has made up his mind to run for president but, instead of waiting on Lemacks 3 reporters to publish everything bad about him in the newspaper, he is going to come out with everything bad that he has done in the past. Twain uses dark humor when he writes, â€Å"The rumor that I buried a dead aunt under my grapevine was correct. †¦ Does that unfit me for the presidency? The Constitution of our country does not say so. † (Twain 21) Once again, as he did in Running for Governor, Twain is making up silly crimes that, even though they are serious, one cannot help but chuckle at them. Twain succeeds once more in ridiculing the media through dark humor. Mark Twain wrote hundreds of short stories, essays, and sketches. Many of these works contain two of his favorite techniques; dark humor and irony, which often accompany one another in Twain’s stories. It is through his expert use of the two figurative language devices, along with many others, that Twain was able to criticize the difference in treatment towards different social classes to the extent that he did. Lemacks 4 Works Cited Twain, Mark. Taming the Bicycle: And Other Essays, Stories, and Sketches. Ed. Eric C. Link. New York: Barnes & Noble, 2009. Print.

Understanding the Difference Between Lend and Loan

In formal usage (especially in British English), lend is a verb and loan is a noun. In informal  American English, the use of loan as a verb is generally considered acceptable (particularly when it concerns the lending of money). See the usage notes below. Only lend has figurative uses, as in Lend me your ears or Lend me a hand.Also see:Commonly Confused Words: Loan and Lone Examples: Borrow trouble for yourself, if thats your nature, but dont lend it to your neighbors. (Rudyard Kipling)A bank, so the old saying goes, is a place where you can always get a loan—when you dont need one. Usage Notes Although most expert users of English dislike loan as a verb (I loaned him my pen), except in financial contexts, it must be acknowledged that the usage is sanctioned by dictionaries. If you are not offended by Friends, Romans, countrymen, loan me your ears or by Distance loans enchantment, you may go along with the dictionaries and you will always have a defense.(Theodore M. Bernstein, Miss Thistlebottoms Hobgoblins, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1971)Some people are bothered by the word loan as a verb, preferring to use lend in its place. Theres not much reason for the anxiety—loan has been a verb since around the year 1200, and I think an 800-year probation is long enough for anyone—but its now little used in America. My advice: dont be bothered by loan as a verb but, if you want to avoid irritating those who have this hangup, its never wrong to use lend.(Jack Lynch, The English Language: A Users Guide, Focus, 2008)The verb loan is well established in American usage and cannot be considered incorrect. The frequent objections to the form by American grammarians may have originated from a provincial deference to British critics, who long ago labeled the usage a typical Americanism. Loan is, however, used to describe only physical transactions, as of money or goods; for figurative transactions, lend is correct: Distance lends enchantment. The allusions lend the work a classical tone.(The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 4th ed., 2000)These are sometimes interchangeable, sometimes not. Only lend carries the figurative senses of adding or giving, as in lend strength to the cause or lend color to an otherwise routine event. But for other senses, as when property or money pass temporarily from one owner to another, either word could be used. . . . In American and Australian English, the verb loan is readily used as an alternative to lend in such applications--but not so much in contemporary British English. The word was used in Brita in up to C17, but a curious resistance seems to have developed there during C18 and C19, when the Oxford Dictionary (1989) citations are all from the US, and the word somehow acquired provincial associations. Fowler (1926) noted that it had been expelled from southern British English, but that it was still used locally in the UK. Yet Gowers writing after World War II found it returning to British government writing (1948, 1954) and weighs in against it in his 1965 edition of Fowler as a needless variant (1965). This seems to be the basis on which British usage commentators argue that loan must be used only as a noun (except in banking and finance) and lend as a verb. Some British dictionaries (Collins, 1991) and the Canadian Oxford (1998) still echo the inhibition, while data from the BNC [British National Corpus] shows that many British writers are comfortable with it. (Pam Peters, The Cambridge Guide to English Usage, Cambridge University Press, 2004) Practice   (a) Never _____ your car to anyone to whom you have given birth.(Erma Bombeck)(b) Gus asked Merdine for a _____. Answers to Practice Exercises (a) Never  lend  your car to anyone to whom you have given birth. (Erma Bombeck)(b) Gus asked  Merdine  for a  loan.