Longinus

I would like to begin this response by considering an apparent contradiction of ideas presented in
Longinuss Peri Hupsous which I have labored to reconcile in my mind. In his introductory discussion of
the fve sources of sublimity, Longinus argues that pity, grief, and fear are found divorced from
sublimity and with low efect. (8.2) The inclusion of fear in this list is initially perplexing given the
signifcance he later attributes, consistently throughout the work, to danger. He even praises the
impressive and afecting sense of terror conveyed in Homer which maintains the frightening and imminent
danger before death. Longinus is here describing the authors organization of language and detail to
realize emotional efects in the audience. The example he ofers by Aristeas diverges from the passage by
Homer because, unlike the latter, its polished and skilled composition are not inspiring of awe.
Before extending these questions it is necessary to defne some of Longinuss terms. Sublimity is
a kind of eminence or excellence of discourse. (1.4) This excellence of speech is not, as he stresses
throughout, a skillful or artful perfection, though it does require method and harmonious structure.
Rather, sublimity entails a grandeur productive of ecstasy ekstasis, not denoting pleasure but transport;
that is, a transport of one beyond oneself. The combination of wonder and astonishment, Longinus
continues, always proves superior to the merely persuasive and pleasant. Persuasion is something we
can control, whereas amazement and wonder exert invincible power and force. (1.4) Astonishment
speaks to something outside of our control and is thus involved in the ecstatic transgression of our selves.
I should note there that I am not employing the concept of a modern identitarian self. I believe what
Longinus is conveying is a transgression of knowable, everyday, human experience. Perhaps the fear and
other emotions cited earlier correspond to this common experience, which is more facilely assimilated,
whereas the sublime makes a strong and inefaceable impression on the memory. (7.3) Not
instantaneous, the lingering sublime demands further refection because it draws us beyond the limits of
the immediate and fnite language which produces it. Language is generative of the sublime, but
sublimity is also always in excess of that language and cannot be contained in the mere words. (7.3)
The excessiveness of sublimity, of the ecstasy brought about by sublime language and thought,
requires equal daring on the part of the speaker, almost to the point of recklessness. This is the distinction
between the genius of Plato and the mediocrity of pure and correct writers. (33.1)
It may also be inevitable that low or mediocre abilities should maintain themselves generally at a correct
and safe level, simply because they take no risks, and do not aim at the heights, whereas greatness, just
because it is greatness, incurs danger. (33.2 my emphasis)
Remaining within the comforts of artistic soundness, of impeccability of technique, the speaker
may evade criticism, but it is only in the risk of going too far that she may transport the audience to a
higher level. For this reason Longinus exalts the fgures of hyperbaton and metaphor which, in their
hazardous display, cause the listener or reader to feel the very peril of the languages structure itself. But I
think the above passage is illuminatingly provocative for another reason: beyond considering the
potential for rhetoric or discourse to move us deeply, Longinus bestows to us a passionate meditation on
the nature of human existence. Other literary qualities prove their users to be human; sublimity raises
us towards the spiritual greatness of god. (36.1) It seems to me that Longinus diverges from Plato on this
point in that the latter seemed to oppose spiritual greatness with the vulgarity of our human nature.
Love, for instance, was valued to the extent that it directed us towards higher contemplation,
transcending our own humanity. Longinus, however, seems to say that sublimity is already inherent in
our human experience. It is not so much a transcendence of our humanity as a realization of its fullness.
Nature made man to be no humble or lowly creature. (35.2) And he proceeds:
The universe therefore is not wide enough for the range of human speculation and intellect. Our thoughts
often travel beyond the boundaries of our surroundings. If anyone wants to know what we were born for,
let him look round at life and contemplate the splendour, grandeur, and beauty in which it everywhere
abounds. (35.3)
Indeed, he identifes Sapphos excellence as drawing on real life at every point. (10.1) The
complexity of emotion she communicates in her poetry is precisely that which lovers experience
themselves. The grandeur of language, in efect, becomes a response to the very call and demand of our
own nature to be elevated and exalted by true sublimity. (7.2) Perhaps we do not understand this
desire, or do not foresee a way to arrive there. Perhaps it is the awe and astonishment which allows for us
to do so. This awe which is also the panic of death; which is why Homer fxes his sailors at the moment of
fear, retains for the reader the possibility of the sailors and her own death.
Danger, then, is essential not only to the greatness of the speakers language, but also to our own
existence. A word which Longinus repeatedly introduces is urgency. Visualization (which I will not
explore here) brings urgency and passion into our words. (15.9) Hyperbaton is considered a very real
mark of urgent emotion. (22.1) Death itself forces upon us a sense of urgency: the contemplation of life
as it nears the end, reconciliation, the questions which were never posed which now become so
important, the confession to a loved one of that which was never uttered, those fnal declarations which
have been the subjects of endless book compilations; one last word. Longinus, of course, does not confer
upon death sole propriety of sublime astonishment. But I think it exemplifes something which we fnd in
the experience of ecstasy. This is perhaps the signifcance of Homers perilous storm: though the sublime
is not a property exclusive to refection upon mortality, even as it directs us to the grandeur of the Nile,
the Danube, the Rhine, and above all the Ocean, (35.4) it always carries with it something of the intense
urgency of death. Sublimity necessitates danger, and we cannot experience the urgency of danger without
certain risk. We are to the degree that we risk ourselves.
1
Not only does the nearness of our own fatality
allow us to reach some understanding, but we must embrace risk to the point of danger, of perilous
ecstasy beyond the security of what we know in our everyday life if we are to realize the greater
possibilities inhering in our own human nature. This, Longinus tells us, may be our greatest danger and
1
Karmen Mackendrick, Word Made Skin: Figuring Language at the Surface of Flesh. New York: Fordham UP,
2004, p. 23.
fullest purpose, brought into life and into the universe as into a great festival, to be both a spectator and
an enthusiastic contestant. (152)