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The genre of Menippean satire is a form of
satire Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming ...
, usually in
prose Prose is a form of written or spoken language that follows the natural flow of speech, uses a language's ordinary grammatical structures, or follows the conventions of formal academic writing. It differs from most traditional poetry, where the f ...
, that is characterized by attacking mental attitudes rather than specific individuals or entities. It has been broadly described as a mixture of
allegory As a literary device or artistic form, an allegory is a narrative or visual representation in which a character, place, or event can be interpreted to represent a hidden meaning with moral or political significance. Authors have used allegory th ...
, picaresque narrative, and satirical commentary.Paul Salzman, ''Narrative Contexts for Bacon's New Atlantis'', p. 39, in Bronwen Price (editor), ''Francis Bacon's New Atlantis'' (2002) Other features found in Menippean satire are different forms of
parody A parody, also known as a spoof, a satire, a send-up, a take-off, a lampoon, a play on (something), or a caricature, is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satiric or ironic imitation. Often its subj ...
and mythological
burlesque A burlesque is a literary, dramatic or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the manner or spirit of serious works, or by ludicrous treatment of their subjects.
, a critique of the myths inherited from traditional culture, a
rhapsodic Rhapsody may refer to: * A work of epic poetry, or part of one, that is suitable for recitation at one time ** Rhapsode, a classical Greek professional performer of epic poetry Computer software * Rhapsody (online music service), an online mu ...
nature, a fragmented narrative, the combination of many different targets, and the rapid moving between styles and points of view. The term is used by classical grammarians and by philologists mostly to refer to satires in prose (cf. the verse
Satires of Juvenal The ''Satires'' () are a collection of satirical poems by the Latin author Juvenal Decimus Junius Juvenalis (), known in English as Juvenal ( ), was a Roman poet active in the late first and early second century CE. He is the author of th ...
and his imitators). Social types attacked and ridiculed by Menippean satires include "pedants, bigots, cranks, parvenus, virtuosi, enthusiasts, rapacious and incompetent professional men of all kinds," although they are addressed in terms of "their occupational approach to life as distinct from their social behavior ... as mouthpieces of the idea they represent".Frye, Fourth essay, section
Specific Continuous Forms (Prose Fiction)
'
Theodore D. Kharpertian, ''Thomas Pynchon and Postmodern American Satire'' pp. 29–30, in Kharpertia
''A hand to turn the time: the Menippean satires of Thomas Pynchon''
/ref> Characterization in Menippean satire is more stylized than naturalistic, and presents people as an embodiment of the ideas they represent. The term ''Menippean satire'' distinguishes it from the earlier satire pioneered by
Aristophanes Aristophanes (; grc, Ἀριστοφάνης, ; c. 446 – c. 386 BC), son of Philippus, of the deme In Ancient Greece, a deme or ( grc, δῆμος, plural: demoi, δημοι) was a suburb or a subdivision of Athens and other city-states ...
, which was based on personal attacks.


Origins

The form is named after the third century BC Greek cynic
parodist A parody, also known as a spoof, a satire, a send-up, a take-off, a lampoon, a play on (something), or a caricature, is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satiric or ironic imitation. Often its subj ...
and polemicist Menippus.Branham (1997
p.17
/ref> His works, now lost, influenced the works of
Lucian Lucian of Samosata, '; la, Lucianus Samosatensis ( 125 – after 180) was a Hellenized Syrian satirist, rhetorician and pamphleteer Pamphleteer is a historical term for someone who creates or distributes pamphlets, unbound (and therefore ...
and Marcus Terentius Varro, the latter being the first to identify the genre by referring to his own satires as ''saturae menippeae''; such satires are sometimes also termed Varronian satire. According to Mikhail Bakhtin, the genre itself was in existence prior even to Menippus, with authors such as
Antisthenes Antisthenes (; el, Ἀντισθένης; 446 366 BCE) was a Greek philosopher and a pupil of Socrates. Antisthenes first learned rhetoric under Gorgias before becoming an ardent disciple of Socrates. He adopted and developed the ethical side o ...
,
Heraclides Ponticus Heraclides Ponticus ( grc-gre, Ἡρακλείδης ὁ Ποντικός ''Herakleides''; c. 390 BC – c. 310 BC) was a Greek philosopher and astronomer who was born in Heraclea Pontica, now Karadeniz Ereğli, Turkey, and migrated to Athens. He ...
and
Bion of Borysthenes Bion of Borysthenes ( el, Βίων Βορυσθενίτης, ''gen''.: Βίωνος;  BC) was a Greek philosopher. After being sold into slavery, and then released, he moved to Athens, where he studied in almost every school of philosophy. It ...
.


Classical tradition

Varro's own 150 books of Menippean satires survive only through quotations. The genre continued with
Seneca the Younger Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Younger (; 65 AD), usually known mononymously as Seneca, was a Stoic philosopher of Ancient Rome, a statesman, dramatist, and, in one work, satirist, from the post-Augustan age of Latin literature. Seneca was born in ...
, whose '' Apocolocyntosis'', or "Pumpkinification", is the only near-complete classical Menippean satire to survive. It consisted in an irreverent
parody A parody, also known as a spoof, a satire, a send-up, a take-off, a lampoon, a play on (something), or a caricature, is a creative work designed to imitate, comment on, and/or mock its subject by means of satiric or ironic imitation. Often its subj ...
of the deification of Emperor Claudius. The Menippean tradition is also evident in
Petronius Gaius Petronius Arbiter"Gaius Petronius Arbiter"
Satyricon'', especially in the banquet scene "Cena Trimalchionis", which combines epic form, tragedy, and philosophy with verse and prose. Both ''Satyricon'' and Apuleius' '' Metamorphoses (The Golden Ass)'', are Menippea "extended to the limits of the novel". The most complete picture of the genre in ancient times is to be found in the satires of
Lucian Lucian of Samosata, '; la, Lucianus Samosatensis ( 125 – after 180) was a Hellenized Syrian satirist, rhetorician and pamphleteer Pamphleteer is a historical term for someone who creates or distributes pamphlets, unbound (and therefore ...
. The influence of Menippean satire can be found in ancient
Greek novels Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
, in the Roman satires of Gaius Lucilius and
Horace Quintus Horatius Flaccus (; 8 December 65 – 27 November 8 BC), known in the English-speaking world as Horace (), was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus (also known as Octavian). The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his ' ...
, and in early Christian literature, including the Gospels. Later examples include ''
The Consolation of Philosophy ''On the Consolation of Philosophy'' ('' la, De consolatione philosophiae'')'','' often titled as ''The Consolation of Philosophy'' or simply the ''Consolation,'' is a philosophy, philosophical work by the Roman statesman Boethius. Written in 52 ...
'' of
Boethius Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, commonly known as Boethius (; Latin: ''Boetius''; 480 – 524 AD), was a Roman senator, consul, ''magister officiorum'', historian, and philosopher of the Early Middle Ages. He was a central figure in the tr ...
and ''The Caesars'' of
Julian the apostate Julian ( la, Flavius Claudius Julianus; grc-gre, Ἰουλιανός ; 331 – 26 June 363) was Roman emperor from 361 to 363, as well as a notable philosopher and author in Greek. His rejection of Christianity, and his promotion of Neoplato ...
.


Characteristics

Bakhtin identifies a number of basic characteristics that distinguish Menippean satire from comparable genres in antiquity: * There is a significantly heightened comic element, although there are exceptions (for example in Boethius). * There is an ''extraordinary freedom of plot and philosophical invention''. It is not bound by the orthodoxies of legend, or by the need for historical or everyday realism, even when its central characters are based on legendary or historical figures. It freely operates in the realm of "the fantastic". * The unrestrained use of the fantastic is internally motivated by a philosophical objective: a philosophical idea, embodied in a seeker of truth, is ''tested'' in ''extraordinary situations''. * Fantastic and mystical elements are combined with a crude ''slum naturalism'': the 'testing of the idea' never avoids the degenerate or grotesque side of earthly existence. The man of the idea encounters "worldly evil, depravity, baseness and vulgarity in their most extreme expression". * The ideas being tested are always of an "ultimate" nature. Merely intellectual or academic problems or arguments had no place: the whole man and his whole life are at stake in the process of the testing of his idea. Everywhere there is the "stripped down ''pro et contra'' of life's ultimate questions". * A three-planed construction—Earth, Olympus and the nether-world—is apparent. Action and dialogue frequently take place on the "threshold" between the planes. * An ''experimental fantasticality'' in narrative point of view appears, for example the "view from above" (''kataskopia''). * An experimentation with ''psychopathological'' states of mind – madness, split personality, unrestrained daydreaming, weird dreams, extreme passions, suicides etc. Such phenomena function in the Menippea to destabilize the unity of an individual and his fate – a unity that is always assumed in other genres such as the epic. The person discovers other possibilities than those apparently preordained in himself and his life: "he loses his finalized quality and ceases to mean only one thing; he ceases to coincide with himself". This non-finalization and non-coincidence is facilitated by a rudimentary form of "dialogic relationship to one's own self". * Breaches of conventional behaviour and disruptions to the customary course of events are characteristic of the Menippea. Scandals and eccentricities have the same function in 'the world' that mental disorders have in 'the individual' – they shatter the fragile unity and stability of the established order and the 'normal', expected course of events. The inappropriate, cynical word that unmasks a false idol or an empty social convention is similarly characteristic. * Sharp contrasts, abrupt transitions, oxymoronic combinations, counterintuitive comparisons and unexpected meetings between unrelated things are essential to the Menippea. Opposites are brought together, or united in a single character – the noble criminal, the virtuous courtesan, the emperor who becomes a slave. * There is often an element of ''social utopia'', usually in the form of a dream or journey to an unknown land. * Widespread use of inserted genres such as novellas, letters, speeches, diatribes, soliloquys, symposia, and poetry, frequently of a parodic nature. * A sharp satirical focus on a wide variety of contemporary ideas and issues. Despite the apparent heterogeneity of these characteristics, Bakhtin emphasizes the "organic unity" and the "internal integrity" of the genre. He argues that Menippean satire is the best expression and the truest reflection of the social-philosophical tendencies of the epoch in which it flowered. This was the epoch of the decline of national legend, the disintegration of associated ethical norms, and the concomitant explosion of new religious and philosophical schools vying with each other over "ultimate questions". The "epic and tragic wholeness of a man and his fate" lost its power as a social and literary ideal, and consequently social 'positions' became devalued, transformed into 'roles' played out in a theatre of the absurd. Bakhtin argues that the generic integrity of Menippean satire in its expression of a decentred reality is a quality that has enabled it to exercise an immense influence over the development of European novelistic prose. According to Bakhtin, the cultural force that underpins the integrity and unity of Menippean satire as a genre, despite its extreme variability and the heterogeneity of its elements, is ''carnival''. The genre epitomises the transposition of the "carnival sense of the world" into the language and forms of literature, a process Bakhtin refers to as '' Carnivalisation''. Carnival as a social event is "''syncretic pageantry'' of a ritualistic sort": its essential elements were common to a great diversity of times and places, and over time became deeply rooted in the individual and collective psyche. These elements revolved around the suspension of the laws, prohibitions and restrictions that governed the structure of ordinary life, and the acceptance and even celebration of everything that was hidden or repressed by that structure. The apparently heterogeneous characteristics of Menippean satire can, in essence, be traced back to the "concretely sensuous forms" worked out in the carnival tradition and the unified "carnival sense of the world" that grew out of them.


Later examples

In a series of articles, Edward Milowicki and Robert Rawdon Wilson, building upon Bakhtin's theory, have argued that Menippean is not a period-specific term, as many Classicists have claimed, but a term for discursive analysis that instructively applies to many kinds of writing from many historical periods including the modern. As a type of discourse, “Menippean” signifies a mixed, often discontinuous way of writing that draws upon distinct, multiple traditions. It is normally highly intellectual and typically embodies an idea, an ideology or a mind-set in the figure of a grotesque, even disgusting, comic character. The form was revived during the Renaissance by
Erasmus Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus (; ; English: Erasmus of Rotterdam or Erasmus;''Erasmus'' was his baptismal name, given after St. Erasmus of Formiae. ''Desiderius'' was an adopted additional name, which he used from 1496. The ''Roterodamus'' wa ...
, Burton, and Laurence Sterne,N. Frye, ''Anatomy of Criticism'' (Princeton 1971) p. 310-12 while 19th-century examples include the ''John Buncle'' of Thomas Amory and ''The Doctor'' of Robert Southey. The 20th century saw renewed critical interest in the form, with Menippean satire significantly influencing postmodern literature.Branham (1997
pp. 18–9
/ref> Among the works that contemporary scholars have identified as growing out of the Menippean tradition are: *Erasmus, ''
In Praise of Folly ''In Praise of Folly'', also translated as ''The Praise of Folly'' ( la, Stultitiae Laus or ), is an essay written in Latin in 1509 by Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam and first printed in June 1511. Inspired by previous works of the Italian hum ...
'' (1509) *
François Rabelais François Rabelais ( , , ; born between 1483 and 1494; died 1553) was a French Renaissance writer, physician, Renaissance humanist, monk and Greek scholar. He is primarily known as a writer of satire, of the grotesque, and of bawdy jokes and ...
, ''
Gargantua and Pantagruel ''The Life of Gargantua and of Pantagruel'' (french: La vie de Gargantua et de Pantagruel) is a pentalogy of novels written in the 16th century by François Rabelais, telling the adventures of two giants, Gargantua ( , ) and his son Pantagruel ...
'' (1564)
M. H. Abrams Meyer Howard Abrams (July 23, 1912 – April 21, 2015), usually cited as M. H. Abrams, was an American literary critic, known for works on romanticism, in particular his book ''The Mirror and the Lamp''. Under Abrams's editorship, ''The Norton An ...
, ''A Glossary of Literary Terms'' (1985 edition), article on satire, pp. 166–8.
* John Barclay, ''Euphormionis Satyricon'' (1605) * Joseph Hall, ''
Mundus Alter et Idem ''Mundus alter et idem'' is a satirical dystopian novel written by Joseph Hall . The title has been translated into English as ''An Old World and a New'', ''The Discovery of a New World'', and ''Another World and Yet the Same''. Although the tex ...
'' (1605) * Miguel Cervantes, ''
Novelas ejemplares ''Novelas ejemplares'' ("Exemplary Novels") is a series of twelve novellas that follow the model established in Italy. The series was written by Miguel de Cervantes between 1590 and 1612 and printed in Madrid in 1613 by Juan de la Cuesta. ''No ...
'' (1612) *
Robert Burton Robert Burton (8 February 1577 – 25 January 1640) was an English author and fellow of Oxford University, who wrote the encyclopedic tome ''The Anatomy of Melancholy''. Born in 1577 to a comfortably well-off family of the landed gentry, Burt ...
, '' The Anatomy of Melancholy'' (1621) *
Jonathan Swift Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish Satire, satirist, author, essayist, political pamphleteer (first for the Whig (British political party), Whigs, then for the Tories (British political party), Tories), poe ...
, '' A Tale of a Tub'' and ''
Gulliver's Travels ''Gulliver's Travels'', or ''Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. In Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, First a Surgeon, and then a Captain of Several Ships'' is a 1726 prose satire by the Anglo-Irish writer and clergyman Jonathan ...
'' (1726) *
Voltaire François-Marie Arouet (; 21 November 169430 May 1778) was a French Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher. Known by his ''Pen name, nom de plume'' M. de Voltaire (; also ; ), he was famous for his wit, and his ...
, ''
Candide ( , ) is a French satire written by Voltaire, a philosopher of the Age of Enlightenment, first published in 1759. The novella has been widely translated, with English versions titled ''Candide: or, All for the Best'' (1759); ''Candide: or, The ...
'' (1759) *
William Blake William Blake (28 November 1757 – 12 August 1827) was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his life, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of the poetry and visual art of the Romantic Age. ...
, '' The Marriage of Heaven and Hell'' (1794) * Thomas Love Peacock, ''
Nightmare Abbey ''Nightmare Abbey'' is an 1818 novella by Thomas Love Peacock which makes good-natured fun of contemporary literary trends. The novel ''Nightmare Abbey'' was Peacock's third long work of fiction to be published. It was written in late March and ...
'' (1818) *
Thomas Carlyle Thomas Carlyle (4 December 17955 February 1881) was a Scottish essayist, historian and philosopher. A leading writer of the Victorian era, he exerted a profound influence on 19th-century art, literature and philosophy. Born in Ecclefechan, Dum ...
, ''
Sartor Resartus ''Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdröckh in Three Books'' is an 1831 novel by the Scottish essayist, historian and philosopher Thomas Carlyle, first published as a serial in ''Fraser's Magazine'' in November 1833 – August ...
'' (1836) *
Nikolai Gogol Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol; uk, link=no, Мико́ла Васи́льович Го́голь, translit=Mykola Vasyliovych Hohol; (russian: Яновский; uk, Яновський, translit=Yanovskyi) ( – ) was a Russian novelist, ...
, "
Dead Souls ''Dead Souls'' (russian: «Мёртвые души», ''Mjórtvyje dúshi'') is a novel by Nikolai Gogol, first published in 1842, and widely regarded as an exemplar of 19th-century Russian literature. The novel chronicles the travels and adv ...
" (1842) *
Lewis Carroll Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (; 27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, was an English author, poet and mathematician. His most notable works are ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (1865) and its sequel ...
, ''
Alice in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (commonly ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English novel by Lewis Carroll. It details the story of a young girl named Alice who falls through a rabbit hole into a fantasy world of anthropomorphic creatur ...
'' (1865) *
Fyodor Dostoevsky Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky (, ; rus, Фёдор Михайлович Достоевский, Fyódor Mikháylovich Dostoyévskiy, p=ˈfʲɵdər mʲɪˈxajləvʲɪdʑ dəstɐˈjefskʲɪj, a=ru-Dostoevsky.ogg, links=yes; 11 November 18219 ...
, ''
Bobok "Bobok" (russian: Бобок, ''Bobok'') is a short story by Fyodor Dostoevsky that first appeared in 1873 in his self-published ''Diary of a Writer''. The story consists largely of a dialogue between recently deceased occupants of graves in a cem ...
'' (1873) *Fyodor Dostoevsky, ''
The Dream of a Ridiculous Man "The Dream of a Ridiculous Man" (russian: Сон смешного человека, ''Son smeshnovo cheloveka'') is a short story by Fyodor Dostoevsky. It chronicles the experiences of a man who decides that there is nothing of any value in the wo ...
'' (1877) * Aldous Huxley, '' Point Counter Point'' (1928) *
James Joyce James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of ...
, '' Finnegans Wake'' (1939) *
Flann O'Brien Brian O'Nolan ( ga, Brian Ó Nualláin; 5 October 1911 – 1 April 1966), better known by his pen name Flann O'Brien, was an Irish civil service official, novelist, playwright and satirist, who is now considered a major figure in twentieth cen ...
, ''
The Third Policeman ''The Third Policeman'' is a novel by Irish writer Brian O'Nolan, writing under the pseudonym Flann O'Brien. It was written in 1939 and 1940, but after it initially failed to find a publisher, the author withdrew the manuscript from circulation ...
'' (1939) *
Mikhail Bulgakov Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov ( rus, links=no, Михаил Афанасьевич Булгаков, p=mʲɪxɐˈil ɐfɐˈnasʲjɪvʲɪtɕ bʊlˈɡakəf; – 10 March 1940) was a Soviet writer, medical doctor, and playwright active in the fir ...
, '' The Master and Margarita'' (1967) * Terry Gilliam, ''
Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
'' (1985)Freudenburg, Kirk. ''Satires of Rome: Threatening Poses from Lucilius to Juvenal.'' Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. . *
Dave Eggers Dave Eggers (born March 12, 1970) is an American writer, editor, and publisher. He wrote the 2000 best-selling memoir ''A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius''. Eggers is also the founder of ''Timothy McSweeney's Quarterly Concern'', a lite ...
, '' The Circle'' (2013) According to
P. Adams Sitney P. Adams Sitney (born August 9, 1944 in New Haven, Connecticut), is a historian of American avant-garde cinema. He is known as the author of ''Visionary Film'', one of the first books on the history of experimental film in the United States. Life ...
in "Visionary Film", Mennipea became the dominant new genre in avant-garde cinema at the turn of the century. Filmmakers he cited include Yvonne Rainer,
Sidney Peterson Sidney Peterson (November 15, 1905, Oakland, California – April 24, 2000, New York City) was an American writer, artist, and avant-garde filmmaker. He attended UC Berkeley, worked as a newspaper reporter in Monterey, and spent time as a practi ...
, Michael Snow, and
Hollis Frampton Hollis William Frampton, Jr. (March 11, 1936 – March 30, 1984) was an American avant-garde filmmaker, photographer, writer, theoretician, and pioneer of digital art. He was best known for his innovative and non-linear structural films that defin ...
. For Bakhtin, Menippean satire as a genre reached its summit in the modern era in the novels and short stories of Dostoevsky. He argues that all the characteristics of the ancient Menippea are present in Dostoevsky but in a highly developed and more complex form. This was not because Dostoevsky intentionally adopted and expanded it as a form: his writing was not in any sense a ''stylization'' of the ancient genre. Rather it was a creative renewal based in an instinctive recognition of its potential as a form through which to express the philosophical, spiritual and ideological ferment of his time. It could be said that "it was not Dostoevsky's subjective memory, but the objective memory of the very genre in which he worked, that preserved the peculiar features of the ancient menippea." The generic features of Menippean satire were the ground on which Dostoevsky was able to build a new literary genre, which Bakhtin calls
Polyphony Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice, monophony, or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords, h ...
.Bakhtin (1984). pp. 121–22


Frye's definition

Critic
Northrop Frye Herman Northrop Frye (July 14, 1912 – January 23, 1991) was a Canadian literary critic and literary theorist, considered one of the most influential of the 20th century. Frye gained international fame with his first book, '' Fearful Symmet ...
said that Menippean satire moves rapidly between styles and points of view. Such satires deal less with human characters than with the single-minded mental attitudes, or "
humour Humour (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English) or humor (American English) is the tendency of experiences to provoke laughter and provide amusement. The term derives from the humorism, humoral medicine of the ancient Gre ...
s", that they represent: the pedant, the braggart, the bigot, the miser, the quack, the seducer, etc. Frye observed, He illustrated this distinction by positing Squire Western (from '' Tom Jones'') as a character rooted in novelistic realism, but the tutors Thwackum and Square as figures of Menippean satire. Frye found the term 'Menippean satire' to be "cumbersome and in modern terms rather misleading", and proposed as replacement the term 'anatomy' (taken from Burton's ''
Anatomy of Melancholy ''The Anatomy of Melancholy'' (full title: ''The Anatomy of Melancholy, What it is: With all the Kinds, Causes, Symptomes, Prognostickes, and Several Cures of it. In Three Maine Partitions with their several Sections, Members, and Subsections. Ph ...
''). In his theory of prose fiction it occupies the fourth place with the
novel A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itsel ...
, romance and confession.
Northrop Frye Herman Northrop Frye (July 14, 1912 – January 23, 1991) was a Canadian literary critic and literary theorist, considered one of the most influential of the 20th century. Frye gained international fame with his first book, '' Fearful Symmet ...
, '' Anatomy of Criticism'' (1974 edition) pp. 309–12.


See also

*
Carnivalesque Carnivalesque is a literary mode that subverts and liberates the assumptions of the dominant style or atmosphere through humor and chaos. It originated as "carnival" in Mikhail Bakhtin's ''Problems of Dostoevsky's Poetics'' and was further develope ...
* ''
Satire Ménippée The ''Satire Ménippée'' () or ''La Satyre Ménippée de la vertu du Catholicon d'Espagne'' was a political and satirical work in prose and verse that mercilessly parodied the Catholic League and Spanish pretensions during the Wars of Religion in ...
'' (1594) – a satirical work in France during the
Wars of Religion A religious war or a war of religion, sometimes also known as a holy war ( la, sanctum bellum), is a war which is primarily caused or justified by differences in religion. In the modern period, there are frequent debates over the extent to wh ...


Notes


References

*
Bakhtin Bakhtin (Russian: Бахтин) is a Russian masculine surname originating from the obsolete verb ''bakhtet'' (бахтеть), meaning ''to swagger''; its feminine counterpart is Bakhtina. The surname may refer to the following notable people: *Ale ...
, Mikhail. ''Problems of Dostoevsky's Poetics'', translated by Caryl Emerson. Minnesota U P 1984 *Branham, R Bracht and Kinney, Daniel (1997) ''Introduction'' to
Petronius Gaius Petronius Arbiter"Gaius Petronius Arbiter"
Satyrica The ''Satyricon'', ''Satyricon'' ''liber'' (''The Book of Satyrlike Adventures''), or ''Satyrica'', is a Latin work of fiction believed to have been written by Petronius, Gaius Petronius, though the manuscript tradition identifies the author as ...
'
pp.xiii-xxvi
*Kharpertian, Theodore D. ''A Hand to Turn the Time: The Menippean Satires of Thomas Pynchon''. Rutherford: Fairleigh Dickinson U P, 1990. *Milowicki, Edward J. and Robert Rawdon Wilson (2002) "A Measure for Menippean Discourse: The Example of Shakespeare." ''Poetics Today'' 23: 2 (Summer 2002). 291–326. * Wilson, Robert Rawdon and Edward Milowicki (1996) "''Troilus and Cressida'': Voices in The Darkness of Troy." Jonathan Hart, ed. ''Reading The Renaissance: Culture, Poetics, and Drama.'' New York: Garland, 1996. 129–144, 234–240. * Wilson, Robert Rawdon (2002) ''The Hydra's Tale: Imagining Disgust'', U Alberta Press, 2002. * Wilson, Robert Rawdon (2007) ''On Disgust: A Menippean Interview''. ''Canadian Review of Comparative Literature'' 34: 2 (June, 2007). pp. 203–213.
Disgust: A Menippean Interview
'


Further reading

*Ball, John Clement. ''Satire and the Postcolonial Novel.'' Psychology Press, 2003. *Boudou, B., M. Driol, and P. Lambercy. "Carnaval et monde renverse." ''Etudes sur la Satyre Menippee''. Ed. Frank Lestringant and Daniel Menager. Geneva: Droz, 1986. 105–118. *Courtney, E. "Parody and Literary Allusion in Menippean Satire." ''Philologus'' 106 (1962): 86–100. *Friedman, Amy L. ''Postcolonial Satire: Indian Fiction and the Reimagining of Menippean Satire.'' Lexington, 2019. *Kharpertian, Theodore D. "Of Models, Muddles, and Middles: Menippean Satire and Pynchon's V." ''Pynchon Notes'' 17.Fall (1985): 3–14. *Kirk, Eugene P. ''Menippean Satire: An Annotated Catalogue of Texts and Criticism''. New York: Garland, 1980. *Martin, Martial, "Préface" in ''Satyre Menippee de la Vertu du Catholicon d'Espagne et de la tenue des Estats de Paris'', MARTIN Martial (édition critique de), Paris, H. Champion, 2007, "Textes de la Renaissance", n° 117, 944 p.  *Pawlik, Katja. ''Von Atlantis bis Zamonien, von Menippos bis Moers: Die Zamonien-Romane Walter Moers’ im Kontext der menippeischen Satire''. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann, 2016. 35-103. *Payne, F. Anne. ''Chaucer and the Menippean Satire''. Madison: U of Wisconsin P, 1981. *Relihan, Joel. ''Ancient Menippean Satire''. Baltimore, 1993. * Tristram Shandy, "Digressions, and the Menippean Tradition." ''Scholia Satyrica'' 1.4 (1975): 3-16. *Sherbert, Garry. ''Menippean Satire and The Poetics of Wit: Ideologies of Self-Consciousness in Dunton, D’Urfey, and Sterne.'' Peter Lang, 1996. *Weinbrot, Howard D. ''Menippean Satire Reconsidered.'' Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 2005. *Vignes, Jean. "Culture et histoire dans la Satyre Menippee." ''Etudes sur la Satyre Mennippee''. Ed. Frank Lestringant and Daniel Menager. Geneva: Droz, 1985. 151-99. {{DEFAULTSORT:Menippean Satire Satire Literary genres Cynicism