Past Perfect: In the Here and Now

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Born of Celtic stock in Bilbilis, northeastern Spain, Marcus Valerius Martialis, known more plainly as Martial (c. 40–104 A.D.), left home at age 26 to seek his fortune in Rome. There he lived in a garret—“up three flights of steps, steep at that”—cultivating wealthy patrons who would pay him a small stipend or invite him to dinner in exchange for witty conversation and poignant, satirical verses. Eventually, Martial won the patronage of the Roman emperors Titus (79–81 A.D.) and Domitian (81–96 A.D.), whom he shamelessly flattered in his writings. His growing reputation as a man of letters was based on his epigrams—short, pithy poems that often conclude with a barb or a pun. Martial produced over 1,500 epigrams, many of them ribald, all of them expressing his good-natured tolerance of human foibles. In these verses, we see a highly urban Rome, its prostitutes, parvenus, politicians, revelers and bores; but we also hear the poet reflecting on his craft and his fate—sometimes celebrating the spectacle of life and sometimes lamenting that too often we “Miss the rich life within our reach.” After 35 years in the imperial capital, Martial decided to return home to Bilbilis. His friend, the prominent lawyer and writer Pliny the Younger (61–113 A.D.), gave him money for the journey. When Martial died just a couple of years after his return to Spain, a saddened Pliny feared that history would forget Martial’s “great gifts,” especially his “subtle and penetrating” mind. How wrong he was.

(The following selections are taken from Martial: The Epigrams [Penguin Books, 1978], translated by James Michie.)

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What brings you to the city? What wild scheme,

Sextus, tell me, what money-spinning dream?

‘My plan is to become the highest-paid

Pleader in Rome, put Cicero in the shade,

Dazzle the courts in all three Forums …’ Whoa!

Civis and Atestinus (whom you know)

Were barristers, yet neither managed to earn

Enough for the rent. ‘If that fails, I shall turn

Poet: the masterpieces that emerge’ll

Convince you that you’re listening to pure Virgil.’

You’re mad. You see those tramps in threadbare cloaks?

They’re all Virgils and Ovids—standing jokes!

‘Well, then, I’ll haunt rich houses, take the dole.’

Four clients at the most keep body and soul

Together that way; all the rest, pale wraiths,

Starve. ‘What shall I do, then? For my faith’s

Unshaken: I’ll live here.’ Honour the gods,

And you may just survive—against the odds.

—Book 3.38

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Now I’m no longer a paid client-guest,

Why should I put up with your second-best

Menu when you invite me out? You take

Choice oysters fattened in the Lucrine lake

While I suck whelks and cut my lips. You dine

On mushrooms—I’m given fungus fit for swine.

Turbot for you—for me brill. You enjoy

A splendid plump-arsed turtle dove—I toy

With a magpie that died caged. Why, Ponticus,

Do we eat with you when you don’t eat with us?

The dole’s abolished—good: but what’s the point

Unless our meat’s carved from the same joint?

—Book 3.60

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If you and I, Julius, old friend,

Were granted licence to expend

Time without worry, infinite leisure,

Together to explore life’s pleasure,

We’d neither of us bother then

With the ante-rooms of powerful men,

Arrogant busts, ancestral faces,

Or the law’s bitter, tedious cases.

No; strolls, gossip, the Colonnade,

Bookshops, the baths, the garden’s shade,

The Aqueduct, the exercise-ground,

Would constitute our onerous round.

But, as it is, we, both and each,

Miss the rich life within our reach.

We watch the good sun speed and set,

And the lost day goes down as debt.

Would any man, if he knew how

To live, not do it here and now?

—Book 5.20

Born of Celtic stock in Bilbilis, northeastern Spain, Marcus Valerius Martialis, known more plainly as Martial (c. 40–104 A.D.), left home at age 26 to seek his fortune in Rome. There he lived in a garret—“up three flights of steps, steep at that”—cultivating wealthy patrons who would pay him a small stipend or invite him to dinner in exchange for witty conversation and poignant, satirical verses. Eventually, Martial won the patronage of the Roman emperors Titus (79–81 A.D.) and Domitian (81–96 A.D.), whom he shamelessly flattered in his writings. His growing reputation as a man of letters was based […]