digito monstrari
excerpt from upcoming DEGUSTING PERSIUS by W J $tephens
Photo by Wassim Chouak on Unsplash
en pallor seniumque! o mores, usque adeone
scire tuum nihil est nisi te scire hoc sciat alter?
at pulchrum est digito monstrari et dicier hic est.
ten cirratorum centum dictate fuisse
pro nihilo pendes?
(Persius, Carm. 1.26-30)
Paleness…there’s senility!1 Oh, morals! Is your
knowledge such a nothing, unless another knows that you know it?2
Nice to be pointed out…for the people to say “that’s him.”3
To have been the object of dictation for a hundred curly-headed kids…
count that as nothing?4
P came on sticky. Spoke with innuendo. Accused his opper of vain display and YT-ness. The earlier vetule (1.22) (“spent”) abuse at this point went to countenance, en pallor seniumque! (1.26) Insofar as character, o mores, usque adeone, (1.26) opp’s was self-absorptive.
Antanaclasis of the verb scio (“to know”) scire… scire… sciat…? (1.26-7) implied bodily intimacy,5 specifically “‘of a woman, to know carnally a man,’”6 likely catchphrase insinuation7 conflated with literary know-how, “is your carnal knowledge satisfying only if others know you know?” The phrase scire tuum (1.27) “your knowing” could indicate generic second person, “one’s carnal knowledge,” blanket criticism of all poetic peons.
P graced language “with physical qualities by comparing it to food and sexual stimuli.”8 His polyptotons, repetitions of cognates to differing senses, expanded semantic field, i.e. scire (1.16) (“brightness”) … scire (1.26) (“sexual relations”) … sciat (1.26) (“understand”) … scis (1.54) (“know how”) … scit (1.65) (“knows how”) … scit. (1.132) (“gets how”) Implications imprecise, the verb became untranslatable in its usual sense. Only obvious that the opper was getting joaned.
P’s minimal 664 lines9 was an assortment of 4,647 words.10 1,938 individual words included 1,237 distinctive one-time usages over the course of six poems and prologue.11 Meant 701, more than one of three differing words, often homologous terms, repeated. Interpretation was cumulative.
Opper demurred. Moved away from Horace’s advice to shun the mob, Serm. 1.10.73-6, in favor of a few select readers. Kiddin’ me? It’s litest to be ID’d, at pulchrum est digito monstrari et dicier hic est, (1.28) He asked, askance, ten cirratorum centum dictate fuisse pro nihilo pendes? (1.29-30) (“Hunnit school kids reading me ain’t squat?”)
Hand gesture could be as important to P as it was to hip-hop. (cf. 1.59, 1.118) Opper’s defiant digito monstrari (1.28) connoted either singling out for praise (“telling about”) or denunciation (“telling off”) with cheeky middle finger.12 The adjective, from monstrum, (“evil portent, monstrosity”) elicited horror or wonderment. (“You get in my way, I’ma feed you to the monster”)13 A portion of its meaning was schadenfreude of a listener’s discomfit.
P was partial to enlarging the equivalence of closely related but not synonymous words. Substitution of pallidus (1.26, 1.124) (“pallid”) for albus (1.16, 1.59, 1.110)14 (“noticeably white”15) amassed criticism of the opper as old, worn, shallow, impuissant, unpigmented. Seeming skin tone reference, auriculas …albas (1.59) (“white ass-ears”) became more deeply aspersive, one of many “iunctura acres, (5.14)”16 striking expressionistic collocations that wittingly played on counterpart meanings.
P ameliorated a form of the root palleo (“to pale”) in iratum Eupolidem praegrandi cum sene palles (1.124) to turn pejorative into abstract flattery, being bleached out by study of Greek Old comic Eupolis’ irate ironies. Interchanged figurative and literal senses of oblique speech. for stirring impact. Part of hip-hop’s reading, by way of Signifyin(g), was “critique of standard (white) meaning,” owing to both black and white interpretations.17 Hip-hop travestied thug and swoop poses, presumptive white personations.18 Self-abasing, practitioners often exaggerated rejection of cultural norms in sociopathic stance. Listeners might could like to think Jackboys & Shec Wes engaged in carjacking. But they did joyride synthesizers of the instrumental “Jackboy,” 48 second exposition that led into “Gang Gang.” (“gang gang gang gang gang gang gang”…19) (0:22)
Listen to the songs referred to in this post on Soundcloud:
Reckford, Kenneth J., Recognizing Persius (Princeton 2009) 41
Dominik, William J. and Wehrle, William T., Roman Verse Satire (Bolchazy-Carducci 1999) 45
Rudd, Nial, The Satires of Horace and Persius (Penguin 1973) 139
Reckford (2009) 41
Bramble, J. C., Persius and the Programmatic Satire (Cambridge 1974) 133 n2
Bramble (1974) 150
Gildersleeve, Basil L., The Satires of A. Persius Flaccus (Project Gutenberg 2007) 84
Dessen, Cynthia S., The Satires of Persius (Illinois 1968) 95
Dessen (1968) 94
Morford, Mark, Persius (Boston 1982) 77
Morford (1982) 77
Bramble (1974) 100
Eminem, Luis Resto, Alex Villasana, d.a. got that dope, Juice WRLD, “Godzilla,” 2020, Music to be Murdered By (0:38)
Harvey, R. A., A Commentary on Persius (Leiden 1981) 30
Freudenburg, Kirk, Satires of Rome (Cambridge 2001) 168
Harvey (1981) 30
Gates, Henry Louis Jr, The Signifying Monkey (Oxford 1988) 47
Potter, Russell A., Spectacular Vernaculars (SUNY 1995) 14
VOU, Luxury Tax 50, WondaGurl, Travis Scott, Shec Wes, Don Tolliver, “Gang Gang,” 2019, Jackboys (0:22)