The variety so far considered is but the most elementary of those employed by Ovid. The poet is capable of a much richer and more complex elaboration of the figure than this. And such is his skill that the most elaborate forms have the same ease and fluency as the simplest. The reader is never conscious of the slightest halting, the slightest disturbance of the rhythm, the slightest effort of any sort on the part of the poet to work out a figure whose intricacies would be the despair of a most finished phrase-maker. The second stage of development consists in the repetition of two words in the line, one with form changed and one with form unchanged. Examples in hexameter and pentameter, respectively, are Et sibi pauca rogent: multos si pauca rogabunt (Am. 1, 8, 89); It seems more or less unprofitable to discuss the arrangement of the words in the line in this form of repetition, because the range of possibility is necessarily quite limited by the length of the line. Since almost the whole of the line is taken up by the repeated words, it is practically a necessity to divide the pairs of words between the two halves of the line. There is a good deal of variation from this general statement, but it is not of such a nature as to make it worth while to illustrate. The matter reduces itself to a mere question of whether the identical order or the chiastic shall be employed within the pairs themselves, and whether the pairs shall stand in juxtaposition or be separated by intervening words. The identical order and the separation of the pairs by the intervention of another word are illustrated by the example Sola locat noctes, sola locanda venit (Am. 1, 10, 30).19 This order is much more frequent than the chiastic. Sometimes the two words of one of the pairs are separated by the intervention of another word. When this is the case, a little is lost in emphasis, but on the whole the rhythmical effect is smoother than it is when the words of each pair stand together. An example is Pax Cererem nutrit, pacis alumna Ceres (Fast. 1, 704). The chiastic order and the juxtaposition of the pairs of words are illustrated in Spectabat terram: terram spectare decebat (Am. 2, 5, 43). The most celebrated line of this description in Ovid is Spectatum veniunt, veniunt spectentur ut ipsae (A. A. 1, 99). 19 Other examples are Am. 1, 8, 89; A. A. 1. 262; Her. 2, 143; Ex Pont. 3, 4, 112; et al. Schwering,20 in a very full and interesting appreciation of the line, calls attention to the chiastic order, to the occurrence of the pairs of words in separate halves of the line, and to the charm of the surprise which results from the unexpected alteration of one of the words after the other has been effectively repeated without alteration. This quality of surprise belongs, though in varying degrees of effectiveness, it is true, to all lines which contain the double repetition. We feel it almost as keenly, for example, in Sola locat noctes, sola locanda venit. Here the intervening word noctes and the identical word order within the pairs deprive the line of the suddenness of the change felt in the perfect example. Nevertheless, wherever an altered form follows an unaltered form, we are of necessity held in suspense and made subject to surprise until the line is completed. Very often, when the wit is not so ready as in the lines quoted, it is not at all difficult to predict the second half of the line from the first half, but never in the very nature of the case is the second half a mere repetition of the thought of the first half. Ovid sometimes gets much the same effect through a change of the part of speech in one of the words instead of the more usual inflectional change, as in Restat iter caeli; caelo temptabimus ire (A. A. 2, 37);21 or by using a different word altogether, not even etymologically related, and yet somehow enough like the same to produce the same impression. An excellent illustration of this effect is found in Non debet dolor hinc, debet abesse pudor (Trist. 4, 3, 62). It is a still more intricate refinement of the repetition when both repeated words are made to undergo inflectional change, a variety most easily effected by a mere swapping of cases between the words, as in Speque timor dubia spesque timore cadit (Her. 9, 42). The third stage of elaboration consists in the addition of a third word to the group to be repeated. As each word is added to such a group, it becomes increasingly difficult, of course, to multiply altered 20 De Ovidio et Menandro, Rhein. Mus. 69 (1914), p. 233 ff. Schwering's purpose in examining this particular line is to show its derivation through Plautus from Menander. In view of the frequency with which Ovid employs the figure, and of his evident mastery of it, together with the rather commonplace, though witty, nature of the satire in the line, so characteristic of the poet, it seems quite daring to base an argument concerning source on such a foundation. 21 Other examples are Am. 1, 9, 4; Rem. Am. 119. forms. It is natural, therefore, to find that in most cases of triple repetition involving any change at all only one word undergoes inflectional change. An example, Oscula aperta dabas, oscula aperta dabis (Her. 4, 144). Somewhat more complex is the line Hinc amor, hinc timor est; ipsum timor auget amorem (Her. 12, 61). Here the charm lies in the broken balance of the two halves of the line and in the word grouping of each. In the first half, two emotions are set in opposition to each other with the aid of a single repetition; in the second, they are brought into unexpected harmony by means of a double repetition brought over from the first half, and by the alteration of a single case held till the last breath of the line. Inflectional change in two of the three words occurs in Quod sequitur, fugio; quod fugit, ipse sequor (Am. 2, 19, 36); and inflectional change of all three words in Tu tibi dux comiti, tu comes ipsa duci (Her. 14, 106). If we should extend our consideration of the type of repetition we have been discussing beyond the limits of the single line, we would find an elaboration of the device which would defy description. But in so doing we would take away that very restriction of the short metrical group which, because it renders the achievement more difficult, for that very reason reveals the more clearly the poet's skill in rhythm and rhetoric. Indeed, there are countless instances in which the repetition is spread over the space of the couplet rather than of the line and the couplet is, after all, the unit of elegy-and in these the poet secures about the same effect as in the more restricted field. But there are countless instances, too, in which the repetition is continued beyond the bounds of the couplet itself, sometimes beginning in the pentameter and concluding in the hexameter, sometimes passing beyond the couplet end into a third line-in both cases disregarding the very metrical unit of the verse-form. And the greater the number of lines, the greater the loss to the repetition in compactness, in antithesis, in charm. It finally ceases to be even interesting. The extent, however, to which Òvid can carry such repetition within the line through a short series of verses may at least be pointed out in so excelle... an example as the following: Arguet; arguito; quidquid probat illa, probato! Quod dicet, dicas; quod negat illa, neges! Imponat leges vultibus illa tuis! Seu ludet numerosque manu iactabit eburnos, Tu male iactato, tu male iacta dato! (A. A. 2, 199-204). As has been said, the frequency with which repetition of this description occurs throughout the elegy of Ovid is surprising. There is hardly a page without one or more instances of it, and some passages, like that just quoted, seem little more than elaborate series of antitheses made up of this complex word-play. This is especially the case with the elegy of the first period devoted to the conventional erotic themes. In the period of exile when his elegy is given up to other matters, the poet makes much rarer use of it in any form, and almost none at all in its highly developed complexities. This difference between the two periods in frequency of use is due not to any loss of skill on Ovid's part, nor, on the other hand, to any definite development of his art, but, rather, to the complete change of mood and of subject matter which came about as a result of his public disgrace. Such play with words is totally out of harmony with the seriousness and the personal bitterness of his later poetry. The uses to which the poet puts the device are obvious. Very often repetition in this form, as in other forms, is no more than a mere necessity in the expression of the thought. A given word, not its substitute or synonym, must be repeated in order to complete the statement. There is no emotional quality in it, no intellectual skill: anything else would be incorrect or unsatisfying. Occasionally, on the other hand, the purpose of the repetition is purely that of emotional emphasis. In this use it is found most frequently in such poems as the Heroides, whose tone is wholly serious notwithstanding much that is patently artificial. The effect is illustrated by such lines as Cumque tuis lacrimis lacrimas confundere nostras (Her. 2, 95), Here the sense would have been complete without the repetition, but the emotion has been infinitely deepened by the iteration of the one word in the line which gives clearest expression to the feeling of the line. And one feels that the very change in the inflectional form also in a word of such importance is a decided addition to the emotional emphasis. In these two uses it may be said that the poet is unconscious of any play on words. There is no place for tricking the reader by a deliberate juggling. The one case is simply a satisfying of the requirements of clear statement; the other is a sincere attempt to reproduce in words a very real feeling in the poet's heart or in the heart of a character created by the poet. But these two uses are not the main ones. A certain humorous— one might almost say, comic-element enters into the greater number of instances. It becomes then a conscious juggling with words, a trial of skill on the part of the poet to see what he can accomplish in witty antithesis. It is wholly rhetorical, in the sense that it is an artificial invention to catch and to hold the reader's attention, not natural to straightforward expression. One is tempted to describe it by the adjective "clever" and to imagine that one catches a glimpse of the twinkling eyes of the author as he writes.22 It lends itself finely to the light form of satire which characterizes the Ars Amatoria, and to the preceptorial quality of all his elegy. It is a bright form of playfulness which finds its natural place in the period of youth and of adventure rather than in that of a broken spirit. The University of North Carolina. GEORGE HOWE. 22 Ribbeck, Geschichte d. röm. Dichtung, II, 338, writes: "Noch weiter geht das Wohlgefallen an wörtlicher oder wenig veränderter Wiederholung zweier halber oder auch ganzer Verse unmittelbar hinter einander, welche den Eindruck der Einfachheit, des natürlichen Plaudertones, der Märchenweise bisweilen auch eines neckischen Scherzes, eines Wortspieles machen soll." |