The Satyricon — Volume 04: Escape by Sea
The Satyricon is the oldest novel in existence that wasn't purely religious or philosophical, and it has no interest in being respectable. Written during Nero's reign, it follows the scholar Encolpius and his beautiful young companion Giton as they drift through the Roman Empire's southern provinces, surviving on their wits, their charm, and sheer cheek. This volume finds them taking to sea, fleeing consequences that remain deliciously vague, pursued by enemies both spurned and unknown. They encounter Tryphaena, a woman of dangerous allure, and Lycas, a ship captain whose motives are murky at best. What follows is a romp through storms, seductions, and the absurd theater of human desire, rendered in prose that's simultaneously elegant and filthy. Petronius invented the picaresque novel, but more importantly, he invented a voice: cynical, precise, and utterly uninterested in moralizing. Fourteen centuries before Don Quixote, he understood that the road reveals character, and that character is usually ridiculous.
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“Can't you see that I'm only advising you to beg yourself not to be so dumb?””
— Petronius Arbiter
“Nothing is falser than people's preconceptions and ready-made opinions; nothing is sillier than their sham morality...””
— Petronius Arbiter
“Everyone will find what he's looking for. Nothing pleases everyone: this man gathers thorns, that one roses.””
— Petronius Arbiter
“I said everything that a painful swelling in one's libido tells one to say.””
— Petronius Arbiter
“No man on earth may look on forbidden things as you have done and escape punishment. Especially here, a land so infested with divinity that one might meet a god more easily than a man.””
— Petronius Arbiter
“utres inflati ambulamus. minoris quam muscae sumus, muscae tamen aliquam uirtutem habent, nos non pluris sumus quam bullae.””
— Petronius Arbiter
“After all, I was once like you are, but being the right sort I got where I am.””
— Petronius Arbiter
“Wine there! Wine and dice! Tomorrow's fears shall fools alone benumb! By the ear Death pulls me. 'Live!' he whispers softly, 'Live! I come.””
— Petronius Arbiter
“The trader trusts his fortune to the sea and takes his gains, The warrior, for his deeds, is girt with gold;The wily sycophant lies drunk on purple counterpanes, Young wives must pay debauchees or they're cold.But solitary, shivering, in tatters Genius stands Invoking a neglected art, for succor at its hands.””
— Petronius Arbiter
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Arbiter, Petronius. The Satyricon — Volume 04: Escape by Sea. Lex, lex-books.com/book/the-satyricon-volume-04-escape-by-sea-494b80e4-68eb-49b0-b50d-e3ee713ce63a.Arbiter, P. (n.d.). The Satyricon — Volume 04: Escape by Sea. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/the-satyricon-volume-04-escape-by-sea-494b80e4-68eb-49b0-b50d-e3ee713ce63aArbiter, Petronius. The Satyricon — Volume 04: Escape by Sea. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/the-satyricon-volume-04-escape-by-sea-494b80e4-68eb-49b0-b50d-e3ee713ce63a.
