UCLA

My dissertation considers the messenger of Greco-Roman epic and its evolution from Homer to Dante. At issue is how the epic mode makes sense of the tension between authority, as mandated by the cosmological hegemon Zeus/Jupiter, and the presentation or delivery of that authority by Hermes/Mercury, the god of lies. Considering the chain of reception of the epic herald reveals that epic space is queer space, comprised of infinite possibilities and outcomes that are determined in real time by the intervention of the Mercurial figure, whose oscillation between the dutiful herald and the deceitful trickster represents the tension between closure and catastrophe in the epic mode. I argue that the unique confluence of the Mercurial figure’s functions in Aeneid 4 results in the creation of a narratologically liminal zone called the nusquam (“nowhere”), which operates as a kind of paratext alongside the text. Within the locus of the nusquam, the authoritative lies of the Mercurial figure govern the competing narrative strategies that collide in a time and place outside the diegetic bounds of the epic poem. The staging of space and language in the Mercurial figure’s nusquam reveals that the epic mode is less dependent upon the distant past than it has been considered historically, and therefore, less orientated towards the reclamation of mythical values, but towards the infinite malleability of space/time. Consequently, an analysis of the epic herald demonstrates that a fundamental characteristic of the epic genre is that its authority is rooted to alterity. The Mercurial is that which makes alterity not only possible, but essential to the formulation of the epic diegesis; it mobilizes the quiet/unspoken/tacit counter narratives that run alongside the primary diegesis. My analysis reveals that power derives from the fragmentation of the epic narrative and that trespassers and interlocutors who do not adhere to historical or literary tradition are ultimately responsible for the direction of the epic narrative.