# Can the term Juvenalian irony or satire be applied to the Fool's use of irony /satire in King Lear? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 6, 2024, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918 "2024-04-06T07:02:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Octagon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/2acd7d/32.png) [@Octagon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Octagon)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2024, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/1 "2024-04-06T07:02:10Z")
Can the term ‘Juvenalian’ irony or satire be applied to the Fool’s use of irony /satire in King Lear? I have never seen it described that way anywhere on Google. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [April 6, 2024, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/4 "2024-04-06T12:04:12Z")
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**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2024, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/6 "2024-04-09T21:13:02Z")
**Moderator Note** This thread has been re-opened. Inappropriate posts have been removed. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [April 9, 2024, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/7 "2024-04-09T21:13:11Z")
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**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2024, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/8 "2024-04-10T23:37:36Z")
Can you explain more about why you think it would? I don’t really see the resemblance, but I’ll admit to not having read a lot of Juvenal. Is there something specific you had in mind? ---
**Author:** ![gkster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gkster/32/14107_2.png) [@gkster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gkster)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2024, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/9 "2024-04-10T23:59:08Z")
I’d say that many of the Fool’s speeches fit the definition: [Juvenalian satire | Irony, Cynicism, Mockery | Britannica](https://www.britannica.com/art/Juvenalian-satire): **Juvenalian satire** , in [literature](https://www.britannica.com/art/literature), any bitter and [ironic](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ironic) [criticism](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/criticism) of contemporary persons and institutions that is filled with personal invective, angry [moral](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/moral) indignation, and pessimism. When I’m at work, I can look up articles from research databases that aren’t available through google, ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2024, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/10 "2024-04-11T01:13:55Z")
If so, it wouldn’t be the first time Shakespeare used a clownish character to lampoon the elderly à la Juvenal: > …the satirical rogue says here that old men have grey beards, that their faces are wrinkled, their eyes purging thick amber and plum-tree gum, and that they have a plentiful lack of wit, together with most weak hams… ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Borgia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/larry_borgia/32/156_2.png) [@Larry\_Borgia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Borgia)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2024, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/11 "2024-04-11T01:59:55Z")
That’s me! ---
**Author:** ![Octagon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/2acd7d/32.png) [@Octagon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Octagon)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2024, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/12 "2024-04-11T14:57:35Z")
Thanks gkster. Shakespeare must have read Juvenal or had a passing knowledge of his writings. Some of the Fool’s words do sound bitterly satirical. Take this one satirical comment referring no doubt to Goneril and Regan’s false flattery. “For there was never yet fair woman but she made mouths in a glass” (3.2.36-36) ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2024, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/13 "2024-04-11T19:42:22Z")
Thanks for explaining what you mean! OK, here’s why I don’t see it. (I’m not disputing that Shakespeare was familiar with Juvenal’s works, because of course he was – all educated people in seventeenth-century England would have known their Roman poetry really, really well.) > [@Octagon](#): > > “For there was never yet fair woman but she made mouths in a glass” (3.2.36-36) [This](https://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/Latin/JuvenalSatires6.php) is Juvenal’s expression of a somewhat similar sentiment (pretty and / or rich women get away with everything), and it’s just … not all that similar, either in style or tone, at least not to my ears. By contrast, [this](https://www.online-literature.com/donne/419/) is what Renaissance poets sound like when they’re _trying_ to do Juvenalian satire. (Oh, OK, I also think any poem with the line “Who loves whores, who boys, and who goats” should be shared far and wide.) ---
**Author:** ![Octagon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/2acd7d/32.png) [@Octagon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Octagon)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2024, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/14 "2024-04-11T20:33:21Z")
Thanks Fretful\_Porpentne. Your example is a clear one. I thought perhaps my example was more subtle. But I’ll try to finds a better one. How’s this one? When thou clovest thy crown i ’ th ’ middle, and gavest away both parts, thou borest thy ass o ’ th ’ back o 'er the dirt. Thou hadst little wit in thy bald crown when thou gavest thy golden one away.( Act 1, Scene 4. ) ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2024, 9:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-the-term-juvenalian-irony-or-satire-be-applied-to-the-fools-use-of-irony-satire-in-king-lear/999918/15 "2024-04-11T21:54:10Z")
Hmm. I’d actually say your first example is closer, in that it’s a critical comment about society (or at any rate, pretty women) in general, rather than banter with a specific person about why a specific thing _that_ person did was foolish. (I mean, I guess Juvenal and other classical satirists _do_ write as if they’re addressing particular people by name, but they’re presumably-imaginary people guilty of vices that are widespread in society. Lear, from the Fool’s perspective, is a real person who has made a one-of-a-kind mistake.) I can see where you’re coming from now that you’ve explained it, but I think it’s more of a “kind of looks like it if you really squint” level of resemblance, rather than a clear-cut example.