The Satyricon (Oxford World's Classics) [Paperback]

Note: This is a review of the Penguin Classics edition.

Imagine yourself with the worst hangover of your life. You are lying in bed with a throbbing headache, fighting back a surge of nausea and reviewing the events of the previous evening. You have a hazy memory of eating ungodly amounts of food and drinking way, way too much wine. You're pretty sure that you engaged in some sordid sexual practices, yet none of it was very exciting. The night was seemingly endless. You recall that your companions in the debauch were a couple of thieving pedophiles, one of them wanted for murder. They spent most of their time mocking your host for his lack of social graces and arguing with one another over who would get to sleep with their good-looking sixteen-year-old servant. The whole thing seems like a bad dream.

This summarizes the plot of "The Satyricon," but it's also a pretty accurate description of what reading "The Satyricon" is like: a long, nightmarish expedition with questionable company. It really deserves two stars. I give it three stars only because of its importance as a historical document which offers insight into features of Roman daily life.

"The Satyricon" survives in fragments. The translator of the Penguin Classics edition says that it may once have been a work of twenty books, which would be six to ten times its present length. It is believed to have been written by Titus Petronius, a man of consular rank whose wit, refinement and devotion to the art of pleasure were so renowned that he became known as the Emperor Nero's "Arbiter of Elegance." Petronius was part of Nero's inner circle for years, but eventually fell out of favor and decided to commit suicide rather than face execution or exile. In keeping with his manner of living, Petronius chose to die in style in 66 A.D., cutting his wrists but binding and unbinding them periodically so that he did not die immediately but was able to spend his last hours feasting, singing and talking with his friends, and blasting Nero in the codicils of his will.

Over the centuries, "The Satyricon" has fallen in and out of favor. For many years, its "disgusting indecencies" (lots of sex, voyeurism, crime, flogging, gluttony, and assorted weird things like children being encouraged by adults to engage in sexual intercourse) gave it a dubious reputation and prevented it from being given serious literary consideration. Now, of course, the pendulum has swung in the opposite direction: critics speak of Petronius' "genius" and "The Satyricon" is viewed as a masterful work of satire. Some people regard it as a precursor to the modern picaresque novel. I found it amazingly boring to read given the amount of sex that is sprinkled throughout and, as satire, not very good. The longest chapter is "Dinner with Trimalchio," which describes an over-the-top feast hosted by the newly rich Trimalchio. During the course of the dinner, Trimalchio commits endless social gaffes and is mocked for his ostentation by the protagonist and his companions. Making fun of the nouveau riche must have been a tired subject for satire even back in Petronius' day. I do not agree with the critics who hail Trimalchio as a "great comic character." To me, he seems pathetic and deserving of sympathy. Even as burlesque, the characterization falls flat because Petronius has made him such an easy target; it seems unsporting to laugh at him.

As for the rest of the work, it really cannot be considered "satire," at least not according to our definition of the word, although an argument has been made that the "Satyricon" as a whole may be interpreted as an early example of literary criticism. I don't find that argument convincing. In my opinion, there is only one possible interpretation of "The Satyricon" that supports the view of the work as quality satire. To me, the most intriguing chapter is not the famous "Dinner with Trimalchio" but "The Road to Croton," a chapter which is written almost entirely in verse. It is my view that Petronius had hoped to be taken seriously as a poet in the tradition of Homer, Virgil, and Horace, and that he intended for the content of this long poem to be taken at face value - that is, as a poetic account of the Roman civil war. Perhaps fearing the sort of criticism heaped upon him by the Penguin Classics translator (who dismisses Petronius' "meagre verse talents" with a contemptuous snort), he shielded himself from mockery by putting the poem into the mouth of a minor and slightly ridiculous character. However, I think he had secretly hoped that his talent would be recognized and lauded. If my theory is correct and this chapter is the only one in which we hear Petronius' true voice, it has the effect of rendering the rest of the work a scathing indictment of the state of the Roman Empire under Nero, with the work's "heroes" - or rather, antiheroes - functioning as symbols of the times. However, in all honesty I don't think that my theory is correct. I think the reality is that "The Satyricon" is just not very well written. Three stars.