Makowski Bisexual Orpheus Ovid

Bisexual Orpheus: Pederasty and Parody in Ovid
Author(s): John F. Makowski

Source: The Classical Journal, Vol. 92, No. 1 (Oct. - Nov., 1996), pp. 25-38
Published by: The Classical Association of the Middle West and South
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BISEXUAL ORPHEUS:
PEDERASTY AND PARODY IN OVID
ergilian
in
inspiration,
Ovid's tale of
Orpheus
is,
on the
surface at
least,
a
story
of
marriage
between husband and
wife and of the
triumph
of
conjugal
love over death.
Yet,
in
what is one of Ovid's most
striking divergences
from his antecedent
in
Georgics
4,
bisexuality
in the form of
pederasty
comes in for
considerable
highlighting.
For not
only
does the
principal undergo
a
psychological change
of
sex,
as we are
explicitly
told at
10.83-85,
but also his narrative within the
poet's
own
develops
at some
length
the theme of Greek love
among
the
gods.
An
analysis
of Book 10
will show that
homosexuality
is no mere isolated detail of
Orpheus'
characterization but that the motif underlies much of the narra-
tive's
diction,
imagery,
and use of
literary
reminiscence. For
example,
the theme serves to
explain
in
part
the
framing
of Book
10,
since
the
Iphis story
with its elaborate
disquisition
on
homosexuality
(9.726-63)
stands in immediate
juxtaposition
to the tale of
Orpheus,
husband and
pederast,
while the death scene in Book 11 is moti-
vated
by
a
misogynist's contempt
for women. In
effect,
we
may
consider the narrative from 9.666 to 11.66 as the
Metamorphoses'
homoerotic or bisexual
sequence.
This is
interesting
because,
in
contrast,
Vergil
does not breathe a word on the
subject
of homo-
sexuality,
even
though
he was
certainly
aware of the Hellenistic
tradition that made
Orpheus
the father of Greek love. Ovid's
emphasis
on homoerotic motifs warrants a closer
look,
especially
as it
may prove
useful in
determining
the tone and
purpose
of
the narrative and in
illuminating
salient features of
composition.
For the
Orpheus story
has
always
elicited a wide
range
of
reactions,
among
them the
deeply
moved
(Primmer),
the
utterly cynical
(Anderson),
the
frigidly
indifferent
(Frankel), depending
on
whether the reader sees in it
pathos,
bathos,
or
simply inferiority
to
Vergil.1
1
A. Primmer, "Das Lied des Orpheus in Ovids
Metamorphosen," Sprachkunst.
Beitriige
zur
Literaturwissenschaft
10
(1979) 123-37;
W. S. Anderson
presents
a con-
sistently skeptical reading
in his "The
Orpheus
of
Virgil
and Ovid:
flebile nescio
quid,"
in
J. Warden, ed.,
Orpheus.
The
Metamorphoses of
a
Myth (Toronto 1982) 25-50,
The Classical
Journal
92.1
(1996)
25-38
26
JOHN
F. MAKOWSKI
With Ovid
laughter
is never
very
far
away,
and there is
every
possibility
that,
despite
the
tragic
nature of the raw
material,
Ovid
is
exploiting
his
Vergilian
model for the sake of
parody
and comic
effect.
Thus,
C.
Neumeister,
for
example, comparing
the diction
and
imagery
of
Georgics
4 and
Metamorphoses
10,
sees an ironic Ovid
distancing
himself both from
Vergil
and the values of
Augustus.2
This
study
will further the
argument
for
reading
the
Orpheus
story
as
parody by focusing
on how Ovid
exploits
the
subject
of
bisexuality
as well as related issues of
gender
for the sake of humor
and satire.3 Of relevance here will be recent studies on ancient
homosexuality
which have examined both the attitudes of historical
Romans,
including
Ovid's,
as well as the
handling
of homosexual
themes
among
the
poets.4
This
paper
will
analyze
Ovid's
literary
in his
commentary
to Ovid.
Metamorphoses,
Books 6-10
(Norman,
OK
1972),
and
more
recently
in "The Artist's Limits in Ovid:
Orpheus, Pygmalion,
and
Daedalus,"
Syllecta
Classica 1
(1989)
1-11;
H.
Frankel,
Ovid. A Poet Between Two Worlds
(Berkeley
1945)
219 n. 69. Brooks
Otis,
Ovid as an
Epic
Poet
(2nd
ed.
Cambridge
1970)
74 cautions
against reading
the
story
as evidence of "Ovid's woeful
inferiority"
to
Vergil
but
rather as a
study
in
differing poetic
values. C.
Segal, Orpheus.
The
Myth of
the Poet
(Baltimore 1989)
in characteristic fashion
argues
for ambivalence of tone.
Insightful
discussion is also to be found in G. K.
Galinsky,
Ovid's
Metamorphoses:
An Introduction
to the Basic
Aspects (Berkeley
1975)
and in
J. Solodow,
The World
of
Ovid's Metamor-
phoses (Chapel
Hill
1988).
M.
Janan,
"The Book of Good Love?
Design
Versus Desire
in
Metamorphoses
10,"
Ramus 17
(1988)
110-37 covers much of the same
ground
as
this
paper
but from a
very
different
perspective,
that of eros in relation to the char-
acter of the narrators. The most exhaustive
study,
of
course,
is the
commentary
of
F.
B6mer,
P. Ovidius Naso.
Metamorphosen.
Buch X-XI
(Heidelberg 1980).
Recent discussion in The Forum of The Classical
Journal
90
(1995)
indicates
that the
question
of how to read Ovid's
Orpheus
is the
subject
of a
lively
debate
sparked by
the inclusion of the author on the Advanced Placement
syllabus.
See
especially
the contributions of W. S.
Anderson,
"Aspects
of Love in Ovid's Metamor-
phoses,"
265-69 and S.
Mack,
"Teaching
Ovid's
Orpheus
to
Beginners,"
279-85.
I
cite from W. S.
Anderson,
P. Ovidii Nasonis
Metamorphoses (Leipzig
1977).
2
C. Neumeister,
"Orpheus
und
Eurydike.
Eine
Vergil-Parodie
Ovids
(Ov.
Met.
X.1-XI.66 und
Verg. Georg.
IV.457-527)," WIA
12
(1986)
169-81. See also C. M.
Bowra,
"Orpheus
and
Eurydice,"
CQ (1952) 113-24,
who
posits
a
literary
source
common to
Vergil
and Ovid. For two
very
different
analyses
of Ovid's debt to
Vergil,
see Anderson,
Orpheus (above,
n.
1)
and
Segal (above,
n.
1).
3
On
the
importance
of the connection between sexual
identity
and metamor-
phosis,
see B. R.
Nagle,
"Amor, Ira,
and Sexual
Identity
in Ovid's
Metamorphoses,"
CSCA 3
(1984)
236-55 and G.
Nugent,
"This Sex Which is Not One: De-Construct-
ing
Ovid's
Hermaphrodite," differences:
A
Journal of
Feminist Cultural Studies 2
(1990)
160-85. For an examination of the
religious
and
psychological significance
of the
ambiguity
of
gender
in a number of Ovidian
tales,
see S.
Viarre,
"L'Androgyne
dans les
Metamorphoses
d'Ovide,"
in
Journfes
Ovidiennes de Parminie
(Brussels 1985)
229-43;
and L.
Curran,
"Rape
and
Rape
Victims,"
Arethusa 11
(1978)
213-41.
4
The two most
important
studies are those of S.
Lilja, Homosexuality
in
Republican
BISEXUAL ORPHEUS 27
exploitation
of
homosexuality
in
explicit
statements,
such as at
10.83-85,
in his
manipulation
of
literary
antecedents,
and in his
diction and
imagery
and,
in the
process, argue
that Ovid's
purpose
here is to undermine the
Vergilian
characterization of
Orpheus by
satirizing
him as an
effeminate,
gynophobic pederast.5
Although
the
literary
tradition
usually paints
a
positive picture
of
Orpheus
as the
tragic
lover,
consummate
musician,
and
epony-
mous founder of the
Orphic mysteries,
other views were current
among
the
ancients,
not all of them
flattering.6
There is also a
consistent and
long-standing
tradition
attributing
to
Orpheus
either
pederasty
or
misogyny
or both. Plato's
Symposium (179D),
for
example,
dismisses
Orpheus
as a
typical
citharoedus,
that
is,
an effeminate musician and a craven
unwilling
to die for his
wife,
while the
Republic (620A)
tells of his hatred for the female
sex.7
Orpheus
as homosexual first
appears
in the
third-century elegist
Phanocles,8
who in his
"Epcore.
KaAof narrates the
story
of
Orpheus'
love for his fellow
Argonaut,
the tender Calais. The same
text tells of him as
aetiological
founder of Greek love and of his
distaste for
women,
which led to his death:
and
Augustan
Rome
(Helsinki 1983),
esp.
79-81 and E.
Cantarella,
Bisexuality
in the
Ancient World
(New
Haven
1992),
esp.
136-39. An earlier
study
is that of B. C.
Verstraete,
"Ovid on
Homosexuality,"
CN & V 19
(1975) 79-83,
who has a
good
discussion of the evidence for Ovid's views on
homosexuality, though
his conclusions
about the theme in the
Orpheus sequence
are at variance with
my
own.
s Anderson,
Orpheus (above,
n.
1)
has noted Ovid's
negative
treatment of
Orpheus' pederasty
and factors it into his overall
analysis
of Book 10. This
paper
owes much to his
reading
but differs
by seeking
a closer focus on the homosexual
theme itself and its
larger implications
for the
structure, tone,
and
imagery
of 9.666-
11.66.
6
J. Heath,
"The Failure of
Orpheus,"
TAPA 124
(1994)
163-96,
challenges
the notion that the characterization of
Orpheus
as unsuccessful is of
late,
that
is,
Hellenistic
provenance
and in the
process
adduces a
great
deal of ancient evidence
contradicting
the conventional view of
Orpheus
as idealized lover.
7
Scholars now
recognize
that the tradition of
Orpheus'
"unmanliness"
predates
Plato,
on which see D.
Sansone,
"Orpheus
and
Eurydice
in the Fifth
Century,"
C&M
36
(1985) 53-64,
esp.
60 n. 30. See Heath's discussion
(above,
n.
6; 180-81)
of the
scholiast on
Apollonius Arg.
1.23,
who remarks on the
incongruity
of the
weakling
Orpheus consorting
with the heroes of the
Argo.
The cliche of
lyre-playing
as
effeminate occurs also in
fragments
184 and 185
(Nauck)
of
Euripides' Antiope.
On
the
subject
of
gender-based puns
on
Orpheus
in
Plato,
see F. M. Ahl,
Metaformations.
Soundplay
and
Wordplay
in Ovid and Other Classical Poets
(Ithaca 1985)
190-91.
8
The most convenient discussion of the Phanocles
fragment
is found in N.
Hopkinson,
A Hellenistic
Anthology (Cambridge
1988)
177-81. M.
Marcovich,
"Phanocles
ap.
Stob.
4.10.47," AJP
100
(1979)
360-66
argues
that Phanocles' version
of the
Orpheus story
with its
pederastic
motif is derived from earlier sources,
and
also that this version was much more common than
previously thought.
28
JOHN
F. MAKOWSKI
'OV iEV PtGTOVi6E; KaKORi'XojVOt dWptX10Ect( Ot
EKzcTvov, ~irjl qoCTyavaC
0OlihlaEv0xt,
oiVEKCCa spUooE
i81tEV
0vtp
OptKEaottV
Epoaq;
&ppevaw, obir'
x6'ou0
0 ijtveoe
r
0X'pTov
The Phanoclean tradition is consistent with what
appears
in the
Orphic fragments
and in the
mythographers,
the sources
giving
various
specifics
about what
galled
the maenads who murdered
Orpheus:
he
spurned
the love of
women,
or he refused to share his
rites with the female
sex,
or he had seduced husbands
away
from
their wives and
taught
them to follow his
example
of
loving boys.9
Against
this
background,
it is instructive to
compare
how
Vergil
and Ovid handled the issue of
Orpheus' pederasty
and
misogyny.
Vergil's familiarity
with the homoerotic element in the
Orpheus
legend
is clear from the subtle but unmistakable traces at
Georgics
4.
516,
nulla
Venus,
non ulli animum
flexere hymenaei,
and at
520,
spretae
... matres.
These, however,
are
merely vestigial
hints from
earlier
sources,
as
Vergil
chooses,
in
effect,
to
suppress
the
specifics
of
homosexuality
and
misogyny.
This
suppression may
come as a
surprise, given
that
Vergil
himself was no
stranger
to Greek love
either in his
personal
life or in his other
poetry,
but it is
completely
understandable in
light
of his thematic
purpose
in the
Orpheus
narrative,
which he casts as
tragedy
of the
highest
order.10
Thus,
at
the end of the
tale,
when the maenads kill
Orpheus
because he
disdained
them,
our distinct
impression
is that this disdain was
not due to hatred of women in
general
but that it was
merely
the
shadow side of
Orpheus'
love for
Eurydice,
which after her death
remained exclusive
and,
needless to
say,
heterosexual.
What
Vergil suppresses
Ovid not
only spells
out in
explicit
fashion but treats with such fulsome elaborateness that the reader
must be either amused or embarrassed." For one
thing,
Ovid reduces
9
B6mer on
10.83
and 11.1-66 has a full treatment of the
pre-
and
post-Ovidian
sources of
Orpheus' bisexuality.
Evidence of Roman
familiarity
with this version
shows
up
in the Vatican
Mythographers (1.76),
where we hear of
Orpheus
as
perosus
omne
genus femineum,
and in
Hyginus (Poet.
Astr.
2.7):
Nonnulli
aiunt,
quod Orpheus
primus puerilem
amorem
induxerit,
mulieribus visum contumeliam
fecisse;
hac re ab his
interfectum
... Cuius
caput
in mare de monte
perlatum,fluctibus
in insulam Lesbum est
reiectum;
quod
ab his sublatum et
sepulturae
est mandatum. Pro
quo beneficio
ad musicam
artem
ingeniosissimi
existimantur esse.
10
On
Vergil's
use of homoerotic
themes,
see
J. Makowski,
"Nisus and
Euryalus:
A Platonic
Relationship," CJ
(1989) 1-15,
esp.
n. 32 for the evidence on
Vergil's
own life.
"
Anderson,
Orpheus (above,
n.
1)
36-39
presents
a convenient list in columnar
fashion of the
key
elements of the
Orpheus story
as told
by Vergil
and Ovid. For an
BISEXUAL ORPHEUS 29
Orpheus' period
of
mourning
for
Eurydice
to seven
days (Vergil's
had mourned seven
months),
and then adds that within two
years
he forsook the love of women
entirely (Met. 10.79-85):
omnemque refugerat Orpheus
femineam
Venerem,
seu
quod
male cesserat
illi,
sive fidem
dederat;
multas tamen ardor habebat
iungere
se vati: multae doluere
repulsae.
ille etiam Thracum
populis
fuit auctor amorem
in teneros transferre mares
citraque
iuventam
aetatis breve ver et
primos carpere
flores.
Ovid unsettles our belief in
Orpheus'
devotion
by arousing
our
cyni-
cism with the
disjunctive
alternatives in the seu ... sive
clauses,
which leave us to
question
the
operative
motivation here:
Orpheus'
fidelity
to
Eurydice
or his failure as lover of women?12
Before we
can wonder too
long,
in an intertextual corrective to the
Georgics,
Ovid,
as it
were,
"outs" his own character and informs us in
dead-pan
fashion of
Orpheus' misogyny
and
pederasty.
All of this is done in
the delicate diction and
preciosity
of Alexandrian
pederastic poetry:
the
phrase
teneros mares is
suggestive
of Greek
paidika
and Roman
deliciae,
some even
seeing
it as a
periphrasis
for mascula
scorta.'3
The mention of
youth, springtime,
and the flower of
youth
are all
standard homoerotic stuff.14 Within the
space
of a few short lines
Orpheus
has
gone
from
tragic
lover of
Eurydice
to trivial
pederast
worthy
of inclusion in Strato's Musa Puerilis. The sudden transfer
of sexual
energy
to the
male,
the revulsion toward the
female,
the
total obliviousness towards
Eurydice,
who will not be mentioned
again
for some seven hundred lines as
Orpheus
concertizes on
pederastic
and
misogynist
themes,
is
telling
and invites a closer
look at Ovid's estimation of Greek love.
Although
Ovid,
the most heterosexual of the
Augustan poets,
has less to
say
on the
subject
of
homosexuality
than his
counterparts,
examination of Ovid's
parody
of
Vergilian
diction and narrative
technique,
see
Neumeister (above,
n.
2).
P.
Knox,
Ovid's
Metamorphoses
and the Traditions
of Augustan
Poetry (Cambridge
1986)
48-64
analyzes Orpheus' story
from the
perspective
of Ovid's
art of allusion in the Callimachean mode.
12
Anderson,
Orpheus
(above,
n.
1)
44 cites this
passage
as Ovid's "insidious
'improvement"'
on
Vergil
and
says
that it raises "the
spectre
of an
egoistic
husband
who
literally
blames his wife for
dying,
even
though
he has been the cause, and
then decides that
marriage
isn't worth the trouble."
13
So Bomer ad loc.
14
See S. Taran, "EIlI TPIXEE: An Erotic Motif in the Greek
Anthology," JHS
(1985)
90-107.
30
JOHN
F. MAKOWSKI
there is
enough
in his works to form a clear
picture
of his views.
On the basis of the
evidence,
recent
studies,
most
notably
those of
Lilja
and
Cantarella,
concur that Ovid's attitude toward homosexual
love was less than
positive.15
The
poet's
most
explicit
statement on
his aversion to
pederasty
is in the Ars Amatoria
(2. 683-84):
odi
concubitus,
qui
non
utrumque
resolvunt:
hoc est cur
pueri tangar
amore
minus.
Ovid
objects
to
man/boy
love on the
grounds
that it does not
give
equal
satisfaction to both
partners,
since,
according
to the classical
and idealized ethos of
pederasty,
the
boy
was
thought
to
experience
no
pleasure.16
The statement is
clearly derogatory,
even
though
the
objection
rests on
grounds
of
personal preference
rather than on
philosophical grounds
of
morality
or naturalness. Further cor-
roboration of Ovid's bias
against
men who lust after males
appears
elsewhere in the Ars:
si
quis
male vir
quaerit
habere virum
(1.524)
and
forsitan
et
plures possit
habere viros
(3.438).17
Consonant with Ovid's
attitude toward
homosexuality
is his view of effeminate
males,
whom he
subjects
to a
good
dose of censure and ridicule
(A.A.
1.505ff).
Female
homosexuality gets
no more
positive
treatment,
as
indicated
by
Heroides
15,
where we can infer a
negative
view of
lesbianism from
Sappho's
letter to Phaon:
quas
non
sine crimine amavi
(19)
and
Lesbides,
infamem quae mefecistis
amatae
(201).18 Thus,
both
from the
"personal" poetry
and the fictional we see a consistent
view which
may
be summed
up by
the statement of Peter Green:
"Ovid's
general
attitude toward adult
homosexuality
is
casual,
pragmatic,
and dismissive."19
However,
it is the
Metamorphoses
which contains Ovid's most
damning
denunciation of
homosexuality.
This occurs in the
story
of
Iphis,
in its denouement a
happy story
of
marriage,
but at heart a
15
Lilja
(above,
n.
4) 79-81;
Cantarella
(above,
n.
4)
136-39.
16 Lilja (above, n. 4) 79-80 also points out that these lines may contain an
ambiguity
as to whether Ovid
rejects pederasty absolutely
or
merely
as less
pref-
erable to the love of
women,
depending
on whether one takes minus to mean "not" or
"less." P.
Green, trans.,
Ovid. The Erotic Poems
(Harmondsworth 1982)
211
captures
the line
very
well: "I hate it unless both lovers reach climax:
/
That's
why
I don't
much
go
for
boys."
See also Tr.
2.409-412,
where Ovid
speaks
of the shamefulness of a
poet
(probably Sophocles) portraying
a mollem Achillem in
tragedy.
For
Ovid's views on
lesbianism,
see H.
Isbell, trans.,
Ovid. Heroides
(London-
Harmondsworth
1990)
132.
19
P. Green
(above,
n.
16)
355.
BISEXUAL ORPHEUS 31
tale of lesbian
passion,
confusion of
gender,
and trans-sexualism. It
is no accident that the
episode
with this
complex
of motifs stands
in immediate
juxtaposition
to the
Orpheus story.
The
centerpiece
of the
Iphis story
is the
monologue
on the
pathology
of homoerotic
love
(9. 726-63),
a
speech
remarkable both for its rhetorical
display
and for its insistence on the unnaturalness of homosexual
passion.
The maiden
Iphis, having
fallen in love with
Ianthe, soliloquizes
on her obsession
(9.726-30):
"quis
me manet exitus"
inquit,
"cognita quam
nulli,
quam prodigiosa novaeque
cura tenet Veneris? si di mihi
parcere
vellent,
parcere
debuerant;
si
non,
et
perdere
vellent,
naturale malum saltem et de more dedissent!
For
Iphis
the
passion
of a female for another female is both a cura
prodigiosa
as well as a cura novae Veneris.20 Love as a care is a conven-
tion of Roman
poetry
from Lucretius on
down,
but this cura
goes
beyond anything
felt
by
even the most tortured of heterosexual
lovers. The word
prodigiosa
is
significant
as it connotes a
type
of
love not wondrous but rather monstrous in the same sense that
freaks of nature are monstrous.
Iphis
even draws
analogues
from
the animal
kingdom
that underscore the unnatural character of this
passion
lower than that of beasts
(731-34):
nec vaccam
vaccae,
neque equas
amor urit
equarum;
urit oves
aries,
sequitur
sua femina
cervum;
sic et
aves coeunt,
interque
animalia cuncta
femina femineo
correpta cupidine
nulla est.
The lines with their
juxtaposition
of
male/female
polarities,
ela-
borate use of
assonance, alliteration,
and
play
with
polyptoton
and
grammatical gender
(vaccam
vaccae . . .
femina femineo) effectively
express
mock abhorrence of same-sex unions.21 The
monologue
reaches an
outrageous
rhetorical climax when a reductio ad absurdum
extols even
bestiality
as
preferable
to
homosexuality,
as
Iphis
cites
20
B6mer
ad
loc.
well
analyzes
the
complex
of
"angst"
and unnatural love in
the
Iphis episode.
21
Of
course,
the
speech
of
Iphis
will receive
shocking
reinforcement later at
10.320ff.,
where
Myrrha
looks to the animal
kingdom
as
precedent
for her
passion.
For an
analysis
of similar diction and themes in the Salmacis
story,
see
J.
Lepick,
"The Castrated Text: The
Hermaphrodite
as Model of
Parody
in Ovid and Beau-
mont,"
Helios 8
(1981)
71-85.
32
JOHN
F. MAKOWSKI
the
exemplum
of
Pasiphae's passion
for the bull as more natural
than her
own,
since at least it had the virtue of
being
within the
heterosexual norm
(735-38):
"ne non tamen omnia Crete
monstra
ferat,
taurum dilexit filia
Solis,
femina
nempe
marem: meus est furiosior
illo,
si verum
profitemur,
amor."
The
speech
ends with a rhetorical
question underscoring
the
irony
of the situation in which the
gods
of heterosexual
marriage
Juno
and
Hymenaeus
are to bless a
wedding
that has no
groom
but rather
features two brides
(762-63):
pronuba quid Iuno, quid
ad
haec,
Hymenaee,
venitis
sacra,
quibus qui
ducat
abest,
ubi nubimus ambae?
The
story,
of
course,
has a
happy ending engineered by
the
divinely
ordained
sex-change,
itself a comment on the
superiority
of hetero-
sexuality
over
homosexuality
and of
marriage
over tribadism.
The
story
of
Iphis,
thus,
stands as frame and
proleptic
comment
on the
forthcoming
tale of
Orpheus.22
Ovid's
technique
in the narra-
tive of
toying
with
gender
and
sexuality
sets the tone for the
Orpheus
story
that
opens
Book 10.
For,
the
story
of
Iphis begins
as a tale
of
impossible
lesbian
passion
resolved
by
heterosexual
marriage,
while the
Orpheus
tale
begins
with a
marriage
but one that will leave
the husband a
pederast.
Also,
Iphis'
denunciation of same-sex love
in Book 9 stands as a
preemptive
comment on the
type
of love
Orpheus
will turn to after the death of
Eurydice
and
prepares
us for the
gender play
that will
permeate
much of Book
10.23
Ovid
injects
no overt
negative
comments on
homosexuality
into
the
Orpheus sequence,
as further remarks on unnatural
passion
22 Many
commentators have noted
parallels
between the two
stories,
for
example,
Galinsky (above,
n.
1) 86-92,
who discusses the affinities of the
Orpheus story
to
both the
Iphis
tale as well as to those in his own
song.
See also Otis
(above,
n.
1)
passim
166-230,
and
J-M Frecaut,
"Les Transitions dans les
Metamorphoses
d'Ovide,"
REL 46
(1968) 247-63,
who comments on the humorous function of the
Hymenaeus
transition between
Iphis
and
Orpheus.
23
It
may
be
objected
that
Iphis
denounces
only
lesbian
passion
rather than
homosexuality
in
general,
and
certainly
in the historical
realm,
a man like Martial
was
capable
of
embracing pederasty
while
satirizing
female homoeroticism. But
given
what we know of Ovid's own attitude toward
pederasty, coupled
with the
parodic
treatment of
Orpheus' homosexuality,
there is
every
reason to think that
Ovid was
equally
disdainful of both male and female
homosexuality.
BISEXUAL ORPHEUS 33
would be redundant with
Iphis' monologue
still fresh in our ears.
However,
if this
reading
of the
Iphis story
is
correct,
and if we
keep
in mind Ovid's statements on
homosexuality
from his other
poetry,
we may see a far more
devastating critique
of
Orpheus'
homoeroticism. 4 This
undermining
is evident in the
catalog
of
trees,
in Ovid's
parody
of
Vergil's stag
from Aeneid
7,
in the tales told
by
Orpheus,
and
finally
in the
closing
frame for Book
10,
the death of
Orpheus
at the hands of the maenads.
The humor of the
catalog
of
trees,
with its
exaggeration
and
parody
of earlier
literature,
has
long
been noted.25 We should
underscore, however,
that this
catalog
itself contains a number of
mythological
undercurrents which alert us to Ovid's concerns with
issues of
gender
and
sexuality.26
It has been
noted,
for
example,
that innuba laurus alludes to the
Daphne story;
so also the
aquatica
lotos recalls the
grotesque metamorphoses
of
Dryope
in
9,
another
love
object
of
Apollo,
the father of
Orpheus
and himself the sub-
ject
of two
pederastic
tales soon to come. At line 99 we hear of the
ivy
and elm-an echo of the same
imagery
found in Catullus'
epithalamion
(61.106-109). Following
these allusions to tales
centering
on
virginity
and
marriage
comes at last the reference to
the
pine
tree
(103-105):
et succincta comas
hirsutaque
vertice
pinus,
grata
deum
matri,
siquidem Cybeleius
Attis
exuit hac hominem
truncoque
induruit
illo.
The
placement
of the
pine
tree at the
very
end of this
dendrological
catalogue
dense with
mythological
subtext and
right
before the
cypress
with its homoerotic associations is not without humorous
intent. The diction of line 103 is
ludicrous,
as the
phrases
succincta
comas and
hirsutaque
vertice
suggest
an elaborate and
very fussy
24
I cannot
agree
with Verstraete
(above,
n.
4) 80,
who sees Ovid's
handling
of
Orpheus' homosexuality
in terms of
"pathos
and
delicacy"
with no trace of
perversion,
nor with C.
Segal,
"Ovid's
Orpheus
and
Augustan Ideology,"
TAPA
103
(1972) 473-94,
when he
says
477-78 that
Orpheus' homosexuality
is a "realistic
note and a
humanizing
correction of
Vergil."
25
See,
for
example,
Anderson,
Commentary
ad
loc. (above,
n.
1)
and
Galinsky
(above,
n.
1)
182-83. For another
view,
see
Segal, Landscape
in Ovid's
Metamorphoses:
A
Study
in the
Transformation of
a
Literary Symbol
(Wiesbaden 1969)
80. On umbra as
a
possible joke,
see W.
Stephens,
"Descent to the Underworld in Ovid's Metamor-
phoses," CJ
53
(1953)
180.
26
Viktor
Poschl,
"Der
Katalog
der
Biume
in Ovids
Metamorphosen,"
in Medium
Aevum Vivum.
Festschriftfiir
Walter
Bulst,
ed. H. R.
Jauss
and D. Schaller
(Heidelberg
1960)
13-21.
34
JOHN
F. MAKOWSKI
hair-do which would look eccentric even on a woman.27 But then
in line 104 we find out that the
pine
tree,
even
though
feminine
by
grammatical gender,
is no
mythological
heroine as we
might expect
but rather a male of
sorts,
the
self-emasculated,
metamorphosed
Attis. So the
pine
tree is
really
a
foppishly
coiffed
eunuch.28
The
notion is
preposterous
and occurs at a
very significant juncture
in the text as a
prelude
to the tale of
Cyparissus,
the first extended
homoerotic narrative of Book
10,
the
overture,
as it
were,
to
Orpheus'
own
song.
The
parodic
nature of the
Cyparissus
tale has not
escaped
critics, who,
for
example,
have seen the
boy's
excessive
grief
for
the deer as a humorous comment on
Orpheus' supposed grief
for
Eurydice.29
Here more needs to be said on the deer from the
per-
spective
of Ovidian
manipulation
of
gender.
Even
though
the
passage's parody
of
Vergil
has
long
been
noted,
some
critics,
for
example Fordyce,
have either lost their
patience
with Ovid for not
leaving
well
enough
alone or have been
puzzled by
the
overly
detailed
description
of the
beast.30
The
passage
is worth
looking
at
closely
(10.110-16):
ingens
cervus erat late
patentibus
altas
ipse
suo
capiti praebebat
cornibus
umbras;
cornua
fulgebant
auro,
demissaque
in armos
pendebant
tereti
gemmata
monilia
collo;
bulla
super
frontem
parvis argentea
loris
vincta movebatur
parilique
aetate,
nitebant
auribus e
geminis
circum cava
tempora
bacae.
The contrast with
Vergil's
creation could not be
greater.
The deer
in Aeneid 7.483-92 is described with
economy
and a rustic charm
that borders on the humorous.
Seeing
the
potential
for
comedy,
Ovid
presents
his own
"improvement"
on the deer with a
congeries
of details that overwhelms: first come the
preposterous
horns,
large
enough
to
provide
their owner's head with a
private
source of
shade,
and no
ordinary
antlers,
these are
gilded,
while
hanging
from
27
Anderson,
Commentary
(above,
n.
1)
ad
loc.
appropriately
translates succincta
as
"girdled."
What Ovid
thought
of
Cybele's
transvestite eunuchs is
readily apparent
from
his satire of male
effeminacy
in A.A. 1.507-508.
29
So
Anderson,
Metamorphoses (above,
n.
1)
ad 10.86-147.
30 See Fordyce in his commentary on Aen. 7.477. C.
Connors,
"Seeing Cypresses
in
Vergil" CJ
88
(1992)
appreciates
the comic effect of Ovid's deer but does not
consider its thematic
implications.
BISEXUAL ORPHEUS 35
the deer's neck are
jeweled
necklaces,
and a
bulla,
that
is,
a locket
or amulet
conventionally presented
to a child on his
birthday.31
Then,
as if this
frippery
were not
enough, Cyparissus
himself leads
the deer to exotic foods and
garlands
it with multi-colored flowers
and reins it in with a
purple
halter-this last detail
being
one that
inspired
a satiric
epigram
of
Martial.32 Consistent with
the
precious
imagery surrounding
the deer is the
overwrought
diction of line 125
mollia
purpureis frenabas
ora
capistris-noteworthy
in that a
golden
line is
expended
on the most trivial of details. The conclusion is
inescapable:
this
outlandishly caparisoned
beast is a
fop,
if not a
cross-dresser. With its
suggestion
of transvestism the
passage
is
one of
high literary
humor,
as Ovid here makes comic allusion to
the Aeneid within a
larger passage playing
on the
Georgics.
With the arrival of the
cypress
tree,
Orpheus
is
ready
to
begin
his musical
recital,
but not before
sounding
the
strings:
sensit
varios,
quamvis
diversa
sonarent, /concordare
modos
(146-47).
We
may certainly
take these lines as reflective of
Orpheus' pomposity
as a
musician,
but there also
may
be a subtle but
significant
allusion. Ovid's words
are almost an exact translation of Heraclitus'
ri6
ov
y&p q(not
1tacXe(p6JEvEv
ougFpeF-oat,
a
quotation
cited
by Eryximachus,
the
most
pedantic
of the
speakers
in Plato's
Symposium
(187A5),
who
himself
expatiates
on musical
theory
in a most
boring
and
garbled
fashion. This allusion to esoteric theories of music at the
point
where
Orpheus
is about to
open
his mouth in
song
is a brilliant touch
of
pedantry
on Ovid's
part
and underscores the character of
Orpheus,
who,
satisfied with the fine
tuning
of his
lyre,
now
begins.
Philosophical
allusion
gives way
to
literary
allusion,
this time to
Apollonius,
whose
Orpheus
had
sung
a
spell-binding song
on
cosmogonic
and
theogonic
themes
(1.494-525). Any
notion that
Ovid's
Orpheus
will follow suit or
perhaps
even
sing
of
Eurydice
is
rudely
shattered when
Orpheus,
after
making
brief reference
to Homeric and Hesiodic
themes,
only
to
reject
them,
abruptly
announces his
subject-pederasty
and female
immorality (152-54):
puerosque
canamus
/
dilectos
superis, inconcessisque puellas
/
ignibus
attonitas. Hence the
abrupt change
from
high epic style
to the
lighter
lyre (leviore lyra)
in the mode of Alexandrian
poetry,
as
Orpheus
rhapsodizes
on the
boy-love
of
Jupiter
and,
in what is
surely
meant
31 Cf. Plaut. Rud. 1171 bulla aurea est pater quam
dedit mi natali
die;
Pliny
HN
33.10 unde mos bullae
duravit,
ut
eorum,
qui equo
meruissent,
filii insigne
id haberent;
also Paulus-Fest. 36M.
32
Martial 13.96 Hic erat ille tuo
domitus,
Cyparisse, capistro
/ An
magis
iste tuus,
Silvia,
cervus erat?
36
JOHN
F. MAKOWSKI
by
Ovid as a
lapse
in
good
taste,
on his own father's
catamite,
Hyacinth (te
meus ante omnes
genitor
dilexit, 167).
The tone and function of
Orpheus'
tales of
pederasty
and miso-
gyny
have been well
analyzed by
W. S.
Anderson,
who
says
that
"as
the stories
unfold,
Ovid's
inescapable
conclusion forces itself
on
us,
if not on
silly Orpheus,
that
boy-love
ranks far below hetero-
sexual love in terms of
affection,
mutual
concern,
and chances for
extensive
happiness."33
To be
sure,
the tale of
Hyacinth,
like that of
Cyparissus,
closes with the death of the beloved and the frustration
of the
lover,
while the
upshot
of the
Ganymede story
is the trouble
that
pederasty brings
to the domestic life of
Jupiter
and
Juno.
The
balancing
stories of
misogyny
also undermine
Orpheus'
announced
intention of
exposing
women
punished
for their illicit
lusts,
since
the stories of
Pygmalion, Myrrha,
Venus and
Adonis,
and Atalanta
all in the end fail to
prove
his
point
and
show,
again
in the words of
Anderson,
that
"girl-love
refuses to be reduced to a
simple
formula
of libido and
punishment."34
The
closing
frame of Book 10 narrates the death and decollation
of
Orpheus.
The scene is violent and
gruesome,
and,
understandably
for that
reason,
few in number are the critics who have seen the
black
comedy
of the situation.
Solodow, however,
is on the
right
track when he writes: "The terrible scene of
Orpheus'
death at the
hands of the bacchants is not without its
lighter touches."35
Indeed,
the scene is
funny
as the
misogynist
slanderer of women receives
his
comeuppance. Irony
underlies the situation in which the voice
once
capable
of
moving
all of nature is overwhelmed
by
the ca-
cophonous
racket of the
maenads,
and where
Orpheus,
once the
focus of an audience of
trees, birds,
and
animals,
now becomes the
focus of a
very
different
type
of
theater,
namely,
the
gladiatorial
arena,
as the
owl/stag
simile makes clear.36
Operative
here also is
the humor of
gender,
as the effete
rhapsode
becomes the victim
of what is
usually
the
gentler
sex. In
keeping
with the
Euripidean
33
Anderson,
Orpheus
(above,
n.
1)
45. For a more "sincere"
reading
of
Orpheus'
situation and its relation to the other
tales,
see S.
Viarre,
"Pygmalion
et
Orphde
chez
Ovide,"
REL
(1968)
235-47.
34
Anderson,
Orpheus (above,
n.
1)
46. For a
very
different
interpretation
of the
purpose
of
Orpheus' puellae
tales,
see
Galinsky (above,
n.
1)
90.
35J.
B. Solodow
(above,
n.
1) 103;
see also
J-M. Frecaut,
L'esprit
et
l'humour
chez
Ovid
(Grenoble 1972)
169-70 as well as the
commentary
ad
loc.
of
G.
M. H.
Murphy,
Ovid.
Metamorphoses
Book XI
(Oxford 1972).
36J. Miller,
"Orpheus
as Owl and
Stag:
Ovid Met.
11.24-27,"
Phoenix 44
(1990)
140-70 remarks that "the
bird/owl
simile
ironically reconfigures
the scene that the
Thracian women are in the
process
of
destroying."
BISEXUAL ORPHEUS 37
tradition that
depicted
the maenads' violence
against
men,
Ovid
has the women scare off the
sweaty,
muscle-bound farmers
(lines
32-36),
seize their hoes and
mattocks,
and in an
orgy
of violence
dismember first the cattle and then the delicate
rhapsode.
The black
humor of the
epilogue
is
appropriate,
as the
maenads,
in one of
Ovid's more
grotesque metamorphoses,
receive their
punishment
by being
transformed into trees and so serve to remind us of the
trees at the
beginning
of
Orpheus' song.
Sustaining
to the end his intertextual
play
on
Vergil,
Ovid saves
his most delicious
parody
for the
very
moment of
Orpheus'
death,
which elicits from him a
very Vergilian
and
very
fulsome
apostrophe
(11.44-47):
te maestae
volucres,
Orpheu,
te turba
ferarum,
te
rigidi
silices,
tua carmina
saepe
secutae
fleverunt
silvae;
positis
te frondibus arbor
tonsa comas luxit.
Vergil,
it will be
remembered,
had used
very
similar
vocabulary
with a
quadruple anaphora
of te to describe
Orpheus'
cosmic
hymn
of
grief
for
Eurydice
at
Georgics
4.465-66:
te,
dulcis
coniunx,
te solo
in litore
secum, /
te veniente
die,
te decedente canebat. This reminiscence
of
Eurydice
in a cosmic lament for
Orpheus
who has
forgotten
his
wife is a
splendid piece
of
irony, especially coming,
as it
does,
after
the
description
of
Orpheus'
last breath in a
parody
of heroic
epic
diction: in ventos anima exhalata recessit
(43).37
This
irony
is further
heightened
in the
description
of
Orpheus' singing
head. For where
Vergil
made
Orpheus'
head call out the name of
Eurydice
to the echo
of the river
banks,
Ovid's
Orpheus
is
capable
of no more than an
inarticulate
weepy something
or other:
flebile
nescio
quid queritur
lyra, flebile lingua
Imurmurat
exanimis,
respondent flebile ripae (52-53).
Appropriately,
the last we see of
Orpheus'
head is as the
quarry
of
a
petrified
snake,
while his soul
goes
to Hades.
There,
after
acting
like a tourist
revisiting
familiar haunts
(quae
loca viderat
ante,
/cuncta
recognoscit,
61-62),
Orpheus
is reunited with
Eurydice
in a scene
reduced to utter
triviality:
the
couple
is now free to stroll at their
leisure
(for
that is the connotation of
spatiantur
at
64),
and
Orpheus
may
with
impunity
look at his wife whether she walks
behind,
in
37
By
Ovid's time the
expression
was formulaic if not
hackneyed.
Cf. Aen. 2.791
tenuesque
recessit in
auras;
4.705 in ventos vita recessit;
5.526-27
tenuesque
recessit /
consumpta
in
ventos;
10.819-20 vita
per
auras / concessit; 12.952 vitaque
cum
gemitu
fugit indignata
sub umbras. For further
examples,
see
B6mer
ad
loc.
38
JOHN
F. MAKOWSKI
front,
or
along
side. In the
end,
like the audience of
Euripides'
Alcestis,
which is left
wondering
what the wife
might say
to the
husband who broke his
every promise
to
her,
the reader of Ovid is
left to
imagine
the reunion of
Eurydice
with her bisexual
husband,
who
consigned
her to oblivion in favor of
man-boy
love.
JOHN
F. MAKOWSKI
Loyola University Chicago
38
This paper was originally presented at the 1993
meeting
of CAMWS in
Iowa
City.
I am
grateful
to both the editor and the referees of this
journal
for most
insight-
ful
suggestions
and for corrections.
Also,
a
special
note of thanks to Ed Menes.

Makowski Bisexual Orpheus Ovid

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Bisexual Orpheus: Pederasty and Parody in Ovid

Author(s): John F. Makowski

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