Trend in Poetry, which is concerned with "boring" topics.

Discuss meter, interpretation, and all things Latin Poetry
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Greeder
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Trend in Poetry, which is concerned with "boring" topics.

Post by Greeder »

Hello,
I have recently come to think of something I have read quite a while back. Sadly I cannot find the source again, so I turn to this forum with much hope of renewing this memory. I have read that there was a style (like elegies or epics) in latin literature which turned to "boring" topics (everyday stuff etc.), in order to have a chance to unfold the language despite the topic. They saw it as a challenge to make this boring topic into something exciting for the reader/listener just by language. An example would be the moretum in the appendix of Vergil. I think they transported it from greek literature into the latin, as they did with everything. Am I correctly remembering this and, if yes, what are some other examples of this trend?

Hylander
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Re: Trend in Poetry, which is concerned with "boring" topics

Post by Hylander »

Vergil's Georgics are the most outstanding example of this in Latin. They are ostensibly about agriculture. To a limited extent they purvey some of the mundane details of farming, framed in lavishly spectacular verse, but that's just a kind of scaffolding or framework, and they actually go far beyond that. Some may find them boring, but I don't.
Bill Walderman

Greeder
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Re: Trend in Poetry, which is concerned with "boring" topics

Post by Greeder »

Yes, that´s also the work that came to my mind. Maybe my English was not precise enough to bring my idea across. I did not mean that the work is boring. Much the opposite, I meant a mundane thing put into excellent verse and thus being able to purely focus on the language rather than the interesting journey of Aeneas for example. Which may serve as a distraction from the verses. Do you know of any other works like the 2 already mentioned? and also does this trend have its origin with the Neoteroi (who, as I gather, are more concerned with quality as quantity)?

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