Word: augustus
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...Hoping to find out that the D-minus I got on my Rome of Augustus midterm was a mistimed April Fool’s prank...
...obsess about minutiae that really doesn’t deserve that much attention. Expos essays and problem sets have their place—don’t get me wrong—but I know far too many people who have unnecessarily lost sleep worrying about their Rome of Augustus quiz...
...inherently thorny enterprise. It is a tradition that began with Virgil, the Roman poet par excellence, who took ill before he could finish his masterpiece, the Aeneid, and on his deathbed consigned it to flames so that it would not be published without his finishing touches. Western civilization has Augustus to thank for saving the Aeneid from this fiery fate. Countermanding Virgil’s request, he had the poem edited and published against the dead poet’s wishes. The emperor’s motives, however, were less than pure; although he undoubtedly had a sense...
...posthumous release of art is often much more venal and often equally selfish. What Augustus wanted was power, fame and immortality; by having the Aeneid published he achieved or helped himself to achieve, all three. What people want today is money and often there is plenty to be made when the artist dies before his or her work is released. A good example—and there are many—is Jimi Hendrix. As we all know, Hendrix had already achieved demi-god status among in the burgeoning rock and roll scene of the late...
...issues raised by Aaliyah’s death and the release of The Queen of the Damned are, thankfully, far more intriguing than mere self-glorification (Augustus) or venality (whoever is behind the 500 posthumous Hendrix albums). For one thing, there is the infinitely dark, even brutal, irony engendered by the fact that Aaliyah plays the title role: the queen of the damned. If, a la Coleridge, we suspend our disbelief a moment (as viewers of Queen must do) and assume the existence of those quaintly dichotomous extra-somatic resting-places Heaven and Hell, then it seems that only...