Early life
Catullus was born in about 84 BC in a prominent and wealthy equestrian family in the northern Italian town of Verona. There is no biography of him, so I know the details from other people's works and his own poems.
Catullus's father wanted his son to benefit from the city's rich culture, so he sent his youngest son to Rome. Through his poems, people think that during his life in Rome, he met many major politicians at that time, namely Cicero (BC 106-43) who despised his poems and Julius Caesar (BC 100-44), his father's good friend. Suetonius (C.69-C.130140 CE) described the confrontation between Caesar and Catullus in his Twelve Caesar. It is said that the poet slandered Caesar in one of his poems. Caesar responded that it was a stain on his good reputation, but after Catullus apologized, he was invited to dinner. As an aide to Gaius Memius, the governor of the province of Bitinia in Rome, the young poet was indifferent to the political arena and disliked his short-term adventures in the public service (57-56 BC).
Writing style
Catullus saw nothing in his world except Lesbia, and he was able to speak simply, because he felt that nothing was not simple.
He returned to Rome and devoted the rest of his life to poetry. It was at this time that he began to contact a new kind of poet, that is, a new poet. This new genre deviated from Homer's classical epic (about 750 BC) and was based on Hellenistic Alexander aesthetics and the works of Calimarcos, a poet in the 4th century BC. He built his poems on the basis of personal experience with spoken language and wisdom. Historian Norman Cantor wrote in his book Ancient Times that Catullus's poems were the "balance" of idealism, public awareness and optimism in his contemporary marcus tullius cicero. Catullus acknowledged that death is an important part of the human condition, and revealed the other side of Roman life: the existence of pessimism and individualism.
Edith Hamilton, a classicist, wrote in her book The Road to Rome that he could "write a charming poem on his sailboat, anywhere he likes" ... dinner, sadness about his friends or something else "(108). However, he can be as rude and violent as anything in literature. Catullus "poured his feelings into the fiery * * *, with nothing but the simplest expression" (108). To illustrate her point, she quoted a poem he wrote to his beloved lesbian:
Dearest, my life, my life, you said that our love is eternal and the love between us is endless happiness. ( 1 12)
Although he spent most of his time in Rome and eventually owned a small villa in Tiber, a suburb of Rome, many of his poems were set in Verona. Although he avoided public service and participation in the political arena-like many compatriots in the new era-many of his poems still reflect the characteristics, politics, social life and culture of Rome. His poems represent a person who is more interested in private life than public responsibility.
femme
When he arrived in Rome, he fell in love with a young woman who was regarded as the sister of Cicero's enemy, PuBryus Clodius Purche (93-52 BC) and the wife of a late Roman senator. Although she was accused of being notorious, the details of his relationship with her and whether it was completely mutually beneficial were unknown. It is said that she is a lesbian in his love poems-in memory of the Greek poet Sappho from Lesbos (about 620-570 BC).
The lesbian and her sparrow
The lesbian and her sparrow
Edward poynter (public sphere)
Hamilton wrote that Catullus only saw lesbians in his universe, and he was able to speak simply because he felt that nothing was not simple. Cicero had different feelings, hated her, called her "Palatini's Medea" and attacked her in many of his speeches (she supported her brother's politics). Catullus wrote 25 poems for his "lesbians". One of the poems, entitled My Sweetest Lala, expressed his deep love for her:
My cutest lesbian, let's live and love.
Although our behavior was condemned by the saints, but
Let's not call them. The headlights in the sky are indeed there
Their west side is dead, rising straight,
But soon, once our little light came on,
Then we must sleep at night.
He said at the end of this poem:
And, Leah, turn off your little lights and mine.
Crown my eternal night with love. (quoted from Garrigue, 106)
works
Although Catullus's poems were almost lost in the Middle Ages, they survived. A forgotten manuscript survived, was found, copied, copied and lost. Finally, it was recycled and included in the current collection. There are three copies of the "original"-one in Paris, one in Rome and one in London. However, due to poor copying and poor manuscript conditions, several poems are incomplete. The exact number of poems written by Catullus is still controversial, and it is estimated to be between 1 13 and 1 16. It is speculated that at least five poems have been completely lost. Some poems are incomplete; 14 is considered to have a gap of at least one to eight lines. Similarly, fragments of some poems are attached to other poems at will. Moreover, some longer poems may even be divided into two parts. Others, which belong to this young poet, are actually not necessarily his-for example, 18 years old, 19 years old, 20 years old.
His short poems range from 5 lines to 25 lines, and the others are longer, ranging from 48 lines to more than 400 lines. There are even 2- 12 lines of epigrams. Some are very touching, while others are considered obscene. The first 60 poems are very short, written for his friends, lovers and even enemies. Although some of them are friendly and enthusiastic, others may abuse:
Listen, girl, the nose is not very small,
Unhandsome feet,
My eyes are blurred, too
Your fingers are not so slender.
My mouth is watering.
You don't know yours
Is the tongue weird?
(Eleven poems, forty-three poems)
The eight poems in the middle (poem 6 1-68) are considered to be Alexandrian or Greek; The fourth is elegy. One tells the story of peleus's marriage to thetis, the sea god. thetis is the parents of Achilles, a war hero in Greek mythology, and the other tells the story of his brother's early death.
The rest of the poems (69- 1 16) are all about love and sadness. In a poem, it is obvious that his cherished Le *** ia rejected him:
Lesbia, I'm crazy: my brain is worshipped by this, and you have a plan.
It's completely distorted, and now I hate you when I think about you.
(eleven poems, seventy-five)
In one of his most famous poems, he talked about his constant suffering:
I hate and love. If you want to ask
How did I do it? I had no answers.
But now that I think about it, I have suffered.
I feel this torture.
(Poems 11, No.85)
heritage
The cause and exact date of his death are unknown, but St. Jerome, a theologian and historian in the 4th century A.D., insisted that the young poet died around 54 BC at the age of 30. Although almost lost, his poems survived and influenced many poets who followed him. His popularity lasted until the Middle Ages and the English Renaissance. Hamilton summed up the beauty of his poems, compared his poems with william shakespeare's sonnets, and wrote that he could express his lover's ecstasy in words. "In his life, in his love, he was a typical lover, and he died young." ( 1 15)