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Notes
L. Hardwick, ‘Fuzzy Connections: Classical Texts and Modern Poetry in English’, in Tradition, Translation, Trauma: The Classic and the Modern, ed. J. Parker and T. Matthews, Oxford, 2011, pp. 39–60.
W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, New York, 1993, p. 67.
W. E. B. Du Bois, ‘Criteria of Negro Art’, The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, ed. V. B. Leitch, 2nd edn, New York, 2010, pp. 870–77 (875).
In Greek mythology, there are at least two versions of Atalanta, the daughter of Iasus from Boeotia and the daughter of Schoeneus from Arcadia. Ovid’s use of the patronymic Schoeneia (10.660) suggests that he prefers the Arcadian version. For further information on the differing tales, see Apollodorus, The Library, 3.9.2 and V. Emeljanow, ‘Ovidian Mannerism: An Analysis of the Venus and Adonis Episode in Met. X. 503–738’, Mnemosyne, 22, 1969, pp. 67–76 (67–70).
Du Bois, Souls (n. 2 above), p. 64.
W. W. Cook and J. Tatum, African American Writers and Classical Tradition, Chicago, 2010, p. 116.
Cook and Tatum, African American Writers (n. 6 above), p. 119.
Du Bois would have been aware of the various name changes for the city of Atlanta and of the stories behind them. He seems resolute, however, that ‘If Atlanta be not named for Atalanta, she ought to have been.’ The 1837 settlement called ‘Terminus’ changed its name to ‘Marthasville’ in 1843 (in honour of Governor Wilson Lumpkin’s daughter, Martha), and finally to Atlanta in 1845 (n. 35 in C. B. Trace, ‘Atlanta between the Wars: The Creation of the Georgia Department of Archives and History, 1918–1936’, Information & Culture: A Journal of History, 50, 2015, pp. 504–53). Different sources offer multiple versions of the story behind the final name change. Some argue that ‘Atlanta’ itself was a shortened version of ‘Atlantica-Pacifica’, one of the proposed names for the town. It was meant to reflect the convergence of eastern and western rail lines in the city. When the residents settled on Atlanta, suggested by chief railroad engineer J. Edgar Thompson, the current Governor Wilson Lumpkin is said to have added his own flourish to the decision, claiming that his daughter Martha’s middle name was Atalanta, thus the town was again being named in her honour.
Ov. Met. 10.708–39.
Du Bois, Souls (n. 2 above), p. 64.
Ibid., p. 70.
Ov. Met. 10.587. All translations are my own.
Ov. Met. 10.591.
Ibid. The word talaria has been taken to mean several things, including ‘long robes’, ‘sandal laces’, ‘winged sandals’ and ‘wings at the ankles’. For a thorough analysis of the possible translation of this contested word, see W. S. Anderson, ‘Talaria and Ovid Met. 10.591’, Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, 97, 1966, pp. 1–13.
R. J. Bonner, ‘The Boeotian Federal Constitution’, Classical Philology, 5, 1910, pp. 405–17 (417).
Du Bois, Souls (n. 2 above), p. 65.
Ov. Met. 10.564–6; the text mentions simply ‘the god’ (10.564 deus). Cowherd takes the reference to mean that Apollo issued the warning to Atalanta (see ‘The Wings of Atalanta: Classical Influences in The Souls of Black Folk’, in The Souls of Black Folk: One Hundred Years Later, ed. D. Hubbard, Columbia, MO, 2003, pp. 284–97 [289]).
Du Bois, Souls (n. 2 above), p. 70.
Ov. Met. 10.644–8.
Du Bois, Souls (n. 2 above), p. 64.
Cook and Tatum, African American Writers (n. 6 above), p. 116.
Ov. Met. 10.594.
Ov. Met. 10.592–6.
Cowherd, ‘Influences’ (n. 17 above), p. 288.
For more on this idea, see H. Bloom, The Anxiety of Influence: A Theory of Poetry, New York, 1997, pp. 5–6. Du Bois’s use of Cicero is defined by a similar dynamic; see Hanses in this collection.
See the oracle reported at Ov. Met. 10.565-8: ‘fuge coniugis usum. / nec tamen effugies teque ipsa viva carebis’ / territa sorte dei per opacas innuba silvas / vivit… ‘“Flee from the use of (marriage to) a husband. But, nevertheless, you will not flee and though living you will lose yourself.” Terrified by the lot of the god, she lives unmarried in dark forests…’
Ov. Met. 10.636-7: utque rudis primoque cupidine tacta / quod facit ignorans amat et non sentit amorem ‘And she, like one wild and touched for the first time by desire, not knowing what she does, loves and does not realize that it is love.’
Ov. Met. 10.676-8: [Venus:] coegi / tollere et adieci sublato pondera malo / impediique oneris pariter gravitate moraque ‘I compelled her to lift it, and added weight to the lifted apple, and I hindered [her] equally with the weight of the burden and with the delay.’
Du Bois, Souls (n. 2 above), p. 64.
Ibid., p. 64. Here, Hippomenes seems to have become an Odysseus-type, playing tricks in order to get the wife he is interested in.
Ov. Met. 10.663: aridus e lasso veniebat anhelitus ore ‘Dry gasping was coming out of his exhausted mouth.’
Du Bois, Souls (n. 2 above), p. 64.
Ov. Met. 10.691–2.
Ov. Met. 10.686–7.
‘Blazing passion’, in Du Bois, Souls (n. 2 above), p. 64 and in Ov. Met. 10.689–90: concubitus intempestiva cupido / occupat Hippomenem, a numine concita nostro (‘an ill-timed desire for intercourse overtakes Hippomenes, [a desire] roused by my divine will’ [said Venus].)
Du Bois, Souls (n. 2 above), p. 65.
Ibid., p. 70.
Ibid., p. 71.
Ibid., p. 65.
Emphasis mine.
Additionally, Atalanta, as part of her character, originally wanted nothing to do with love. She did not forget it, she simply rejected it.
Though it is beyond the scope of this article to fully address, it is worth noting that Du Bois’s own adaptation and interpretation, a digested form of the complete narrative, recalls the tradition of the 14th-century Ovide moralisé rather than a ‘straightforward’ close reading of, or commentary on, the primary text. He captures the essence of the myth, explains its meaning as a cautionary tale, then applies its meaning to his contemporary world. See, for instance, M. Desmond, ‘The Goddess Diana and the Ethics of Reading in the Ovide Moralisé’, in Metamorphosis: The Changing Face of Ovid in Medieval and Early Modern Europe, ed. A. Keith and J. Rupp, Toronto, 2007, pp. 61–75 (64–5).
Consider that Cook and Tatum begin with Phyllis Wheatley’s classically influenced poetry in their analysis of the intersection between the classical tradition and African American writers. Even if Wheatley’s poetry was not as polemic as Du Bois’s Souls in its own time, her work could be seen as the beginning of the tradition of re-appropriation in the US, a view supported by current scholarship on Wheatley and on the intersections of African American literature and classical reception studies (see N. A. Spigner, ‘Niobe Repeating: Black New Women Rewrite Ovid’s Metamorphoses’, PhD diss., Vanderbilt University, 2014, p. 43). For an in-depth discussion of Wheatley’s experimentation with the classical tradition in her poetry, see E. Greenwood, ‘The Politics of Classicism in the Poetry of Phillis Wheatley’, in Ancient Slavery and Abolition: From Hobbes to Hollywood, ed. E. Hall, R. Alston and J. McConnell, Oxford, 2011, pp. 153–81. Greenwood examines Wheatley’s self-aware play on Latin etymologies and classical themes and her awareness of the ‘cultural presumption constituted by an enslaved African reading and writing about classical themes’ (p. 153). Like Wheatley, as Greenwood interprets her, Du Bois is acutely aware of the implications of non-European people (specifically Afro-descendant authors) laying claim to and utilizing the classics to craft their own literature. Though the two authors come from two distinct contexts that afforded them unequal access to education, we would benefit from considering the potential similarity between Du Bois’s and Wheatley’s reinterpretation of the classics not only at the level of content and style but also at the level of ideological purpose.
H. L. Gates, Jr., The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of African-American Literary Criticism, 25th Anniversary Edition, Oxford, 2014, p. 134.
Ibid., p. 135.
Spigner, ‘Niobe’ (n. 43 above), p. ii.
Ibid., p. 124.
Ibid., p. 125.
T. Roynon, Toni Morrison and the Classical Tradition, Oxford, 2013, p. 187. Roynon examines Morrison’s engagement with Ovid through close readings of key passages from Paradise (1997), Sula (1973), Tar Baby (1981) and Love (2003), which unlike the other three novels resonates with Ovid’s Fasti as the novel satirizes American imperialism.
Du Bois, Souls (n. 2 above), p. 70.
Ibid., p. 70.
E. A. Hairston, The Ebony Column: Classics, Civilization, and the African American Reclamation of the West, Knoxville, TN, 2013, p. 174.
H. Carby, Race Men, Cambridge, 1998, p. 10.
Roynon, Toni Morrison (n. 49 above), p. 174.
Acknowledgements
I offer my deepest gratitude to Stephen Wheeler, whose mentorship and guidance were essential in developing this topic from a seminar paper, to a conference presentation at the 147th AIA/SCS Annual Joint Meeting, and finally to the present work.
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Aigbedion, I.A. Atalanta, The Soul of Atlanta?. Int class trad 26, 27–37 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12138-018-0477-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12138-018-0477-7