Derek Mahon: X: The Idiocy of Human Aspiration

Allusion to Classical figure Seneca, Nero, Democritus, heavenly gods

Allusion to classical place baths, gym, ‘our modern Rome’, Capua, Aquinum, Trevignano, Tivoli, Palatine Hill

Relationship to Classical text Mahon’s poem is based very loosely on the ancient source, focusing on those passages which address more generally the themes of acquisitiveness, violence, corruption and old age, but avoiding the majority of Juvenal’s historical exempla. He ends with a reworking of the last ten lines of the satire.

Close translation of words/phrases/excerpts The poem is a reworking of sections from Juvenal’s tenth satire.

Classical/post-Classical intertexts Both Samuel Johnson and Robert Lowell have produced versions of this satire under the title The Vanity of Human Wishes (see S. Johnson, The Vanity of Human Wishes (London: Printed for R. Dodsley & sold by M. Cooper, 1749) and R. Lowell, Near the Ocean (New York: Farrar, Strauss & Giroux, 1967)) Mahon’s version bears little relation to theirs, though his more scathing title would seem to by referencing one or both of these works.

Further Comment: Mahon’s colloquial address to the reader, adorned with the occasional expletive, is scattered with contemporary references to ‘Binge sex and fiscal heroin’, ‘infotainment’, and second homes: the vices of modern materialism.