Catullus Struggles with Love

Question 1

Two halves of the poem:

Answer 1

L1-12 describe Catullus’s predicament

L13-26 show him agonising over a solution.

Question 2

Themes of the poem

Answer 2

> Catullus’s mental struggle 
> Emotional and personal language
> Religious and financial imagery
> Catullus’s egocentricity
> Advice

Question 3

‘Siqua recordanti benefacta priora voluptas’

If there is for a man any pleasure

Answer 3

Voluptas (pleasure) is placed at the end of the line to convey it in a cynical way as if perhaps there is no pleasure.

Question 4

‘homini’

man

Answer 4

Poem starts off generalising for all men, but it becomes clear that it it about Catullus himself.

Question 5

‘sanctum’, ‘divum’, ‘numine’

Answer 5

Religious vocabulary highlights how Catullus feels he has acted in line with the wishes of the Gods.

Question 6

‘nec…nec…nullo’

not

Answer 6

forceful negatives emphasise his point.

Question 7

‘multa’ and ‘gaudia’

much and joy

Answer 7

These words should naturally be placed together, but Catullus has changed it so that joy is next to love. This shows how happiness in love is unnatural to him.

Question 8

‘ingrato’

Answer 8

first expression of discontent.

Question 9

‘quaecumque homines’

whatever people

Answer 9

Catullus talks about people in general, but it is clear he is really only interested in himself.

Question 10

‘dicere’, ‘facere’/ ‘dicta’, ‘facta’

say and do

Answer 10

Chiasmus and use of bland vocabulary express the poet’s depressed state of mind.

Question 11

‘perierunt’, ‘credita’

Answer 11

Financial imagery adds to the idea that Catullus is owed something.

Question 12

‘menti’

mind

Answer 12

Links to Lesbia being rational and calculating.

Question 13

Quare iam te cur amplius excrucies?
(Why, why now will you torture yourself further?)
quin tu animo offirmas atque istinc teque reducis
(Why do you not be firm in your heart and lead yourself back from there,)
et dis invités dessinais esse miser?
(And stop being love-sick while the gods are unwilling (to help you)?)

Answer 13

Made emphatic by:
> Putting excrucies at end of line for emphasis.
> 3 verbs in 2nd Person (excrucies, offirmas, reducis)
> Personal Pronouns (tu etc)
> ‘miser’ placed at end of line, sentence and first half of poem.

Question 14

‘animo offirmas’
firm in your heart.
‘istinc te que reducis’
lead yourself back from there

Answer 14

Both metaphors.

Question 15

L12: ‘Et did invitis desinis esse miser?’

And stop being love-sick while the gods are unwilling (to help you)?

Answer 15

Sibilance conveys the poet’s disgust.

Question 16

‘longam’/ ‘subito’

long/ suddenly

Answer 16

Juxtaposition highlights the difficulty faced.

Question 17

‘hoc… haec… hoc… hoc’
and
‘sive non pote… sive pote’

Answer 17

Anaphora used to create a forceful, military tone.

Question 18

‘efficias’ ‘facias’

you must make it. You must do this

Answer 18

‘iussive subjunctives’

enforce the militaristic tone used int he second half of the poem.

Question 19

‘o di, si…’

Oh Gods, if…

Answer 19

Typical beginning of a prayer.

Question 20

Repetition of ‘si’ (if) + aspicite (look upon) + ‘erupt’ (snatch)

Answer 20

Creates a sense of pleading.

Overblown language suggests self-mockery?

Question 21

‘me miserum, pestem perniciemque’

Lovesick me, plague and destruction.

Answer 21

Alliteration, emphasises Catullus’s strength of feeling combined with the painful physical effects of love.

Question 22

L17 + 18: Lots of M sounds

Answer 22

indicate misery

Question 23

‘me’… ‘egi’… ‘mihi’… ‘mihi’

Answer 23

Reverts the focus of the poem back to himself.

Question 24

‘expulit ex omni pectore laetitias’

has driven out joy from my heart completely.

Answer 24

> expulit is emphatically placed at beginning.

> Omni placed before picture to emphasis the force of the disease.

Question 25

Last few lines of the poem

Answer 25

Relate back to the themes of the poem and his original wishes.