Welcome to the podcast An Ancient Language for a Modern Soul. Poemi Conviviali by Giovanni Pascoli. Today we will talk about a poem called “Silenus”. “Silenus” is a very peculiar poem whose protagonist is the famous Greek sculptor Scopas. Pascoli narrates how one day he, young Scopas, had a vision of the characters and myths that he would later sculpt. He saw these images in the eyes of a silenus, a mythical creature similar to a satyr, a creature of the god Dionysus. I'm here today with Anne Ward, who is Professor of Political Science at Baylor university in the U.S. She is an expert on ancient Greek philosophy, especially Herodotus, Plato and Aristotle, but also on modern philosophy, and she has worked on Friedrich Nietzsche's early works on Greek tragedy. So we will explore the themes of creativity, art and tragedy in “Silenus”. You will hear the poem in the translation published by James Ackhurst and myself in 2022 for Italica Press. The poem is read by Joanna Strafford. The music has been composed by Giovanni Tardini and is played at the Celtic Harp by Arianna Mornico.
ELENA
Welcome, Anne, and thank you very much for being my guest today.
ANN
Thank you for inviting me, Elena. I'm glad to be here.
ELENA
Thank you. So the poem begins with young Scopas introducing himself. He's a lad from the island of Paros in Greece. He's not yet a sculptor. He will become one, and he will, in fact, become one of the most famous artists of ancient Greece. Scholars reckon that he was active between 375 and 330 BC. Unfortunately, not many of his works remain, but we can still admire his statue of Pothos, that is the god of desire, in the Capitoline museums in Rome, and a beautiful sculpture of a dancing maenad in the Kunstsammlungen in Dresden. But this poem begins with Scopas directly addressing the statue of a Silenus: “Son of Pan”, he says in the first line, so Scopas apparently had gone to a quarry where slaves were hammering big blocks of stone, and one of these blocks had cracked open, revealing the marble statue of a Silenus. So if you have listened to other episodes in this podcast, you know that Pascoli doesn't usually invent his stories, but he rather elaborates upon ancient, and, I have to say, often obscure sources. And even here the inspiration comes from a tale in Pliny the Elder's book Natural History, where Pliny writes that a block of marble in one of the quarries in Paros was once split into wedges and revealed the face of a Silenus in Greek mythology. Sileni. Sileni are mythical creatures with horse like ears who usually accompany the god Dionysus. One silenus was said to be the tutor of the God Dionysus, presiding over the other satires and mythical creatures, so sileni are associated with musical creativity and prophetic ecstasy and drunken joy.
ANN
Elena, if I could just jump in here just to note that in Plato's Symposium, Alcibiades also calls Socrates a silenus and he also calls him Marus, who is known as the father of the sileni. So Silenus may also be associated with philosophy and I think too this is reaffirmed by Nietzsche at the end of Beyond Good and Evil: he presents the god Dionysus, who's holding the hand of Ariadne at this point as practising what I would call a socratic art of dialectic. When touched by the god, says Nietzsche, one is hollowed out of one's old ideas. And this reminds also of how Meno characterises Socrates in the Meno, he's like a torpedo fish. When he touches you, you go numb. He's emptying you out of your old ideas, or what I would say, given knowledge of ignorance. I'd also say the Silenus is also associated with philosophy.
ELENA
That's interesting. These sileni are very intriguing creatures indeed. And so Scopas directly addresses the silenus appearing out of the moon marble. His head is made of marble, but his ears move and his eyes flash. So the whole scene very much feels and reads like a hallucination. Let us listen to the first part of the poem.
ELENA
So in the lines we have just heard, Scopas asks Silenus to show him his vision. His vision contains images that Scopas will sculpt later in his life. The images the Scopas see are a group of young athletes, then a procession of maidens during a celebration in Athens, then the birth of Aphrodite from the sea, then the group of Niobe and her children killed by the wrathful gods Apollo and Artemis. This is a gruesome Greek myth, I have to say, in which Niobe, who was a mortal woman, woman, had boasted to be more fertile than the goddess Latona, mother of Apollo and Artemis. So these two gods had punished her by killing all of her children. And let us listen to it.
ELENA
And finally, the last image after these that you've heard is that of a bacchanal. What we see here, what we've listened to, is that Scopas sees his future works of art in the eyes of Silenus. This is clearly a metaphor for artistic creation stemming from the encounter with a creature of the god Dionysus. So Pascoli published this poem in 1899. So it is hard not to see an echo or an affinity with the ideas about artistic creation being either Apollonian or Dionysian that Friedrich Nietzsche had put forward in his work The Birth of Tragedy.
ANN
I would agree, Elena. Yes. In celebrating the Cellini of ancient tragedy, it seems that Pascoli, like Nietzsche, wishes to bring forth what I would call a new art or a new science that aims neither at, let's say, the socratic, platonic transcendence of material nature in the forms of, nor the modern attempt to conquer material nature. We get something like Francis Bacon. But a scholar, Lawrence Lampert, argues a science which we could consider consistent with modern ecological movements, that delights in the body and celebrates the earth as the material, albeit transient, home and haven of human life. For Pascoli, for Nietzsche, it seems that this new science could be brought into being by a new art. So a new or bring, like the Dionysian tragedy of the past, trying to bring it back into being from the past, which brings those it touches, I think, into an appreciation of their bodies and its deepest longings, so housing us in the body and our body being housed in the earth. The challenge, I think, would be to negotiate between this new art and the egalitarian and individualistic commitments of contemporary liberal democracy. I think that would be the challenge of bringing forth this new art.
ELENA
I agree, and this is very interesting. But, Anne, what do you think of the images that Scopas see? It seems to me that the figures that Scopas will sculpt, they represent the actual realities of human life. So we see pain, we see sexuality, death. So, in other words, that primeval nature that is somehow tamed by civilization, as Nietzsche posits, although Scopas sees them in Apollonian mode, so to speak, which is a dreaming state.
ANN
I agree. I think the images do focus on the apollonian, apollonian aspect of tragedy, namely the characters on stage, who, as Nietzsche claims, are masks representing the god Dionysus himself and meant to give him voice. In other words, the characters are the visual and verbal images of Dionysus that let us see and hear the god and not just feel his presence as we do with the music of the chorus. And this latter is the Dionysian aspect of tragedy. So I think the images focus on the apollonian aspect of tragedy, giving god logos now What struck me about the Apollonian characters that Scopas sees in the eyes of Silenus is two things. First, they're young athletes, young girls, Aphrodite with a growing womb. So she's a young woman, lads. Niobe is pointed out as a young mother. Not just a mother, but a young mother. So youth. And in some ways, I think they're mirrors of Scopas. So even if they're massive Dionysus, they're mirrors of Scopas, who in the first stanza says he is young and he calls himself a lad, and he also calls himself an athlete. And the youth too, he said, I sent my friend home to our school teacher. We to punish an essence. It's a youth. And so in some ways mirrors of Scopas himself. And the second thing I would notice too, about the figures is they're both male and female. For Nietzsche, in The Birth of Tragedy, the most important apollonian characters, or mass of Dionysus are exclusively male. And the most important here, Oedipus and Prometheus. Moreover, Nietzsche argues that both Oedipus and Prometheus represent an original sin of sorts, of incest in the case of Oedipus, and the stealing of fire, the source of life and death from the gods in the case of Prometheus. But according to Nietzsche, by placing this original sin in the male, ancient tragedy meant to dignify sin and celebrate the human rather than the divine. Now, this is in contrast to the biblical account that we know of original sin, that we know places original sin in the female woman. And for Nietzsche, what this means is it intends to condemn sin and elevate God over man. So we see it's very gendered understanding of sin in nature. It seems to me that Pascoli, in suggesting that the mass of Dionysus, the apollonian characters, can be both female and male, indeed, so standing in for Oedipus may be Niobe in some way both female and male, to me, seems more inclusive than Nietzsche and perhaps more democratic and perhaps a little bit more pious.
ELENA
It's interesting, and we know that mother figures and female figures are very important for Pascoli. And I think at this point listeners will have been acquainted with a range of fascinating female figures of his poetry. So it's also interesting that you say he's more pious and because, as listeners know in this podcast, we do not follow the order in which the poems appear in the book. But the order is quite meaningful because Pascoli creates a chronological history of Antiquity and its artistic forms. And in fact, “Silenus” comes after the sequence “Poems of Ate”, which we covered in this podcast, that is devoted to Greek tragedies and to one of the main triggers of their plots is “ate” or “mad folly”, irrationality. So in “Silenus”, it seems to me that Pascoli echoes Nietzsche's ideas about the nature of Greek tragedy in terms of artistic creativity.
ANN
Yes, I think this is definitely so, that Pasculi does, like Nietzsche, see artistic creativity somehow as a form of divine madness, a form of irrationality. But here I think I'd like to focus on some slight or differences between Pascoli's presentation and what I think Nietzsche's presentation and the first, I think, and it's striking in Pascoli’s poem “Silenus” is slavery, the theme of slavery, which is largely absent in Nietzsche's account of tragedy and the birth of tragedy, although it's present in other works such as, for example, the Genealogy of Morals or Beyond Good and Evil, but in this account of tragedy, it's largely absent. The slavery is a prominent theme in Pascoli's poem. Indeed, slaves howling and in pain are mentioned no less than four times in the first two stanzas of the poem. Now, this suggests to me that Pascoli, although endorsing it, is more reticent, perhaps, or cautious about reviving a dionysian art form in our time. Pascoli, it seems, is more aware of perhaps the dangers that a new dionysian art form could pose to equality, democracy and freedom, in contrast to Nietzsche, when you read him, who seems simply to embrace the aristocratic elements of tragedy. So I think Pascoli, in making that theme so prominent, like, well, this is something we want to do, but maybe we want to be cautious too. Second, in Pascoli’s poem, unlike the slaves who clearly suffer, they're in pain, dreaming of home. In Pascal's poem Silenus, or if we say Silenus is really an image of Dionysus, is a happy god, he's first introduced to us laughing, in contrast to the slaves, who are groaning and crying for home and is twice said to be smiling. Now, to me, what's fascinating about this is the suggestion Pascoli is making is that Dionysus can be the source of both comedy and tragedy, and perhaps they're not not that distinct. And so at the end of Symposium, we get the report that Socrates is arguing that a good dramatist should be able to write comedy and tragedy. Is this what the suggestion is? Also, the happy god of Pascoli's poem, I think, contrasts with the suffering god of Nietzsche's Birth of Tragedy. So there is some mention of Birth of Tragedy, the god is smiling, but he's clearly the suffering god. We could say Dionysus is suffering. And we think, well, why would a god suffer? But Dionysus is clearly in pain, he's a suffering god. Now, why is he suffering? Because to Nietzsche, he's a dismembered god. And I think the image that Nietzsche sets forth is that prior to the creation of the cosmos, Dionysus, we believe, is an undifferentiated and hence unintelligible mass of matter. So, like pre-Socratic science, the god is then ripped apart into intelligible species, composed of individuals with species characteristics, what Nietzsche calls individuation. God is individuated, such violence causing the cosmos to come into being. It's a creation story, sexual longing, the presence of the suffering Dionysus in us. Therefore, if we think that image, the suffering is a longing to overcome this individuation and perhaps return to the original unity of matter that we believe existed before our world came into being, or even if we go back to the Symposium, somehow to become the spheres in Aristophanes poem on arrows, where spheres cut in half and that so comedy and tragedy going together in some way, but we somehow, to overcome that individuation, return to that original unity. So for Nietzsche, it seems sexuality is a rebellion against an intelligible universe and a longing for death to overcome individuation, who we are. The god in Pascoli’s poem is happy rather than sad. And this suggests that to me, that Pascoli has a more hopeful view of sexuality than Nietzsche. Pascoli, like Aphrodite, with a growing womb, it's a longing for life, not death, and perhaps not as hostile to rationality or rational control than Nietzsche suggests. So I think that's a difference that comes out in Pascoli’s poem. And the third and last kind of contrast I would sort of point out is that in the Birth of Tragedy, Nietzsche argues that ancient tragedy originated with the satyr chorus, the Dionysian aspect of tragedy, and only the satyr chorus, whereas the Apollonian aspect of tragedy, so characters on stage, such as the god Dionysus himself, or various mass, such as Oedipus and Prometheus, who have voice, who have logos, only arose much later in time. So the effect, according to Nietzsche, of the sole presence of the satyr chorus, and he says this is a mirror in which the audience contemplated themselves or their deepest nature, what Nietzsche characterises as a sexual omnipotence of nature in the earliest Asian tragedy, what it suggests is that's the sole presence of that sexual omnipotence of nature was to encourage ecstatic union between the audience and the chorus or the mass of spectators and their God. And as I describe it, Nietzsche seems to say they came to feel the god's presence, even if they did not see or hear him on stage in such ecstatic union. When this.. and as Nietzsche says, when the spectator runs onto the stage to release our god from suffering, who is suffering, life becomes art and art becomes life. But they fuse. Whereas they fuse together. Now, just for a popular image or explanation of this fusion of art and life or this kind of the audience's ecstatic union with the satyr chorus in which they feel the presence of the god, here in the United States, CNN has just completed a four part series on Live Aid in 1985 to commemorate its 40th anniversary. And this ecstatic union, it strikes me, if we think of U2 lead singer Bono, I think it's the second song they're singing, I think. But he starts to go to the audience, calling them forward, and then he jumps down onto the balcony that separates the main stage from the art and the entire stadium, which must have tens of thousands of people scream. It's like they're watching his body. And then he calls the women for. And they bring women out of the audience and he dances with them in this ecstatic union. So. So the women, the woman especially she becomes part of the artistic scene and the artistic scene becomes reality. And there's this kind of. And the whole audience is watching. So something like. So what Nietzsche is talking about the earliest form of tragedy, when spectators would become unified with the satyr chorus and even run to try and release them from their pain. This would be sort of a modern image. And I have a colleague who also wrote that modern rock heroes are actually Dionysian heroes in the modern age, like Jim Morrison of the Doors, Janice Joplin, ones who die young.
But. So that would just be, that's a popular image of what I think Nietzsche is saying something now with the later development of the apollonian aspect of tragedy. So this is where we would have characters, let's say behind Bono, who are speaking to each other and carrying on the drama. So the apollonian, the visual and verbal image of the god in his mass on stage. For Nietzsche, when that happens, the rationality of culture suppresses the sexuality of nature, although it can never fully extinguish it. Indeed, sexuality is the force that gives cultures energy. For Nietzsche, it seems there's a separation there between the dionysian and apollonian, even in time and in what they do. Just as sexuality rebels against an intelligible universe, so it rebels against or must be held down or redirected, or what Nietzsche would say, sublimated by the rationality of culture. And I think too, for those who haven't read the Birth of Tragedy, a similar understanding can be found in Freud's Civilization and its Discontents. Well, civilisation makes us unhappy because it has to take our sexual longings and redirect them into higher things. And I think a related theme to this in Birth of Tragedy is that for Nietzsche, what he calls Socratism, or let's say Socratic philosophy, destroyed the older ancient tragedy. Now how did it do this? That rationality is opposed to sexuality, which is Socratic rationalism, or rationality in science simply says has a craving for beauty, which is a proportionality, and proportionality means it can be rationally understood. Destroyed. What ancient tragedy craving for the ugly. So the satyr, you know, with his ears and his hooves, the ugly, which is really say the animal nature, passions of man, how did it. And this is what the satyr chorus and tragedy, even with the chorus, is trying to get cultured men back in touch with their body. Which is because through Euripides, he says Euripides, not Plato, but Euripides, who was another student of Socrates, not just Plato, who kept the. The tragic art form in his dialogues, but Euripides, because for Euripides, the prime spectator of his art became Socrates himself. And that means he wanted his tragedy to be rationally understood, had to have meaning. It had to be like politics and literature. We can say what is literature trying to say to us? Whereas actually the ancient were not. It's not. We're supposed to feel it, not think it. So the older tragedy, we're supposed to feel the God and so feel our bodies. What Euripides is trying to do is get us to think or use our minds. So he says that causes the older tragedy to go. But he says he did that because he was trying to please Socrates, who's overly logical, almost like a beast in the over development of his logicism. So what? He separates the individual from their god because the individual to be rationally understood. And so there's a common theme. So philosophy against tragedy, in contrast, this is the last contrast to this Nietzschean sort of separation between sexuality and rationality, nature and culture, tragedy and philosophy. In Pascoli’s poem, the characters appear in the eyes of Silenus, or the Apollonian in the eyes of the Dionysian, they come to be simultaneously again. This suggests to me that Pascoli has a more hopeful view of both sexuality and culture. Rather than conceiving of a radical antagonism between the two, as Freud, Nietzsche do, Pascoli suggests that our sexual longings are shaped or determined by culture, almost a thrownness in some hygiene, in some way. They're not some dangerous force pre existing culture, and so are not as antagonistic to reason a rational direction as perhaps Nietzsche suggests. So just as the god can be happy, I think, so can we. It seems civilisation, it seems, for Pascoli, doesn't necessarily doom us to this discontent. So that'd be the last thing I'd emphasise.
ELENA
Well, this is a very happy note and I'm also very happy that you brought in Live Aid and this image of the women dancing like minutes, because we started the conversation talking about maenads and now we are here in modern times, like, witnessing the same fusion between the artist and the crowd. So thank you very much for this fascinating exploration of not just Pascoli, but Nietzsche and creativity in art and what it means for human life. So now listeners can now enjoy the poem in its entirety. And thank you again, Anne, for being our guest today.
ANN
Oh, no, thank you, Elena, for a great experience.