23. Reading the Imperial Revolution: Martial, Epigrams 10
The art of good reading requires the Roman reader to understand a text on more than one level. Flavian Latin texts presume complex rules for reading and require textually perceptive readers. Martial's text needs to be read as an integral part of Flavian Rome. The chapter addresses Martial's relationship to the political climate in the years 96-98 CE to see what can be deduced about the poet's reaction to the political upheaval of the time. In order to understand better the treatment of Trajan and Trajanic Rome in Epigrams 10 , it is necessary to examine Martial's preceding treatment of emperor and city. The silence about Trajan, the topographical dislocation and Martial's estrangement from political discourse contrast and coincide with Martial's poetic security. The price of that security as of the imperial revolution is the removal of Flavian Rome's most incisive commentator and its greatest wit. Keywords: Epigrams 10 ; Flavian Latin texts; imperial revolution; Martial's poetic security; Roman reader