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"Something like a rich widow:" Spartacus and the Protestant Work Ethic |
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by Andrew Sodroski In considering Spartacus in relation to the Protestant Work Ethic, our first task is to define the Protestant Work Ethic (PWE). Though multifaceted, its salient features are epitomized well by Wayne E. Oates, who states that: A universal taboo is placed on idleness, and industriousness is considered a religious ideal; waste is a vice, and frugality a virtue; complacency and failure are outlawed, and ambition and success are taken as sure signs of God’s favour; the universal sign of sin is poverty, and the crowning sign of God’s favour is wealth.1 The second part of this definition is most relevant here: success as a sign of God’s favor, failure as sin and as the wage of sin. At the heart of the PWE is the notion that external success mirrors inner virtue. This is, of course, the ultimate capitalist fable—that the stratification of society according to wealth and power is divinely ordered. The poor are culpable for their own poverty, while the rich and powerful assume their positions not thanks to luck, shrewdness, or inheritance, but as a result of their natural inner virtue. Spartacus2 postulates and confirms the PWE. It stresses the external manifestation of virtue in bodily perfection and societal stature, using Spartacus (Kirk Douglas) to propose and confirm the validity of the PWE and using the plot, dialogue, and mise en scène to persuade the viewer. First we shall consider the role of virtue in the film; then, we shall see how this links to the internality of power; then finally, we shall examine the film’s conclusion and methods of seduction. The film is preoccupied with the notion of virtue; it is at the very heart of Spartacus. Scattered throughout the film are brief episodes showcasing the various moral systems embraced by the characters, we shall return to several of these later, but the pseudo-Socratic “Oysters and Snails” is the most obvious of these and emblematic of the prominence and overtness of such scenes. Critics seem to find it difficult to discuss the film without referring constantly to the virtue of the characters. Duncan Cooper, in his “Who Killed Spartacus?”3 slips into the same heavy moralizing the film uses when he speaks of Spartacus as a “good man” (18), of “the slaves’ deep love for one another” (26), of “slave owners whose entire existence is bound up with the violent conquest and enslavement of other peoples” (25). This comparison among moralities is central. We are forced constantly to compare the (Christian) morality of Spartacus to the relativism of the Romans and the primitive lex talionis of the slaves. The Romans are constantly presented as amoral relativists. Crassus (Laurence Olivier) tries to seduce Antoninus (Tony Curtis) in his bath with a pseudo-Socratic defense of sodomy as a matter of ‘taste’ not ‘appetite.’ Batiatus (Peter Ustinov) trafficks in gladiators and whores. Glabrus (John Dall) and his wife Helena (Nina Foch) joke with each other about their respective harems, and don’t object to or refrain from infidelity. For, Gracchus (Charles Laughton), religion is a farce and morality is irrelevant, especially where his womanizing is concerned. The vengeful slave morality is seen less often, mostly because the slave populace seem to spend most of their time milling about or flocking across the countryside. We see the vengeance of the slave army briefly after the victory of Metapontum, where a defeated patrician handing over his wealth is attacked viciously by a freed slave. It is made explicit when Crixus (John Ireland) organizes and defends the death-match of two captured patricians against Spartacus’s objections. The third and ultimate moral system is that of Spartacus, who seems a paragon of Christian virtue: he fights only to defend himself; he doesn’t have sex with Varinia (Jean Simmons) until they are ‘married’; he defends the patricians against the anger of the slave-mob; he refuses to allow Antoninus to be crucified, telling him, “I love you as I love my son”; et cetera passim. Cooper points out that, for two full hours, Spartacus, despite his position as general, never draws his sword in battle! We are not wrong to call this morality a Christian morality, despite the anachronism. Spartacus is made to be as Christian as possible—specifically, as twentieth-century-Socialist-Christian as possible. He preaches Christian forgiveness, as opposed to the Jewish lex talionis of the other slaves. He practices an internalized morality, as opposed to the external piety of Gracchus et al. He even “imagines a god [or God? n.b. the singular number] for slaves and I pray.” In Dalton Trumbo’s4 description of the Spartacus he had intended to present, he speaks of Spartacus’s awareness that “the essence of mankind is to rise above the petty ambitions of one’s own self, and identify oneself with… mankind as a whole, with the good of mankind” (32). The prologue situates the rebellion in relation to Christianity, and points to Christianity as the engine that finishes what the slaves set out to accomplish. The film points to Christianity, its history framed within and defined by Christ. Of course, Spartacus prefigures Christ, praying to the god of slaves, dying on a Roman cross to win freedom for his people. Indeed, he even trumps Christ, whose followers allowed Him to be handed over; there is no Petrine denial after Spartacus’s capture! But the inner virtue of the players does not remain within; there is an externalizing of virtue that concords exactly with that of the PWE. Inner virtue is made manifest by external success, and is also made manifest in the body. Spartacus’ virtue (a term we shall henceforth use to refer collectively to Spartacus’ superior morality, his Christian worldview and ethical code, his monotheistic piety, and his selflessness) is made visible to the diagetical and non-diagetical audience alike. To the audience, Spartacus is singled out throughout as the dominant character, even when he is in a servile position. He occupies the center of the frame, is the subject of innumerable reaction shots, is the dominant participant in every conversation depicted among the slaves, is invariably costumed differently than his peers, and is often seen silhouetted against white sand or blue sky. One typical example of this occurs when Spartacus first arrives at the gladiator school, and he and his fellows are being addressed by Batiatus. Everyone else looks at Batiatus, but we cut to a shot from behind the row of slaves, only to see Spartacus turned around to face the camera—a single face in a row of backs-of-heads. Then we cut to a point-of-view shot, from Spartacus’s point of view5, of more slaves facing Batiatus. Again, we see Spartacus, the only one distinguished from the mob by turning away. He is singled out by the other characters as well, most notably in the opening act when Batiatus selects only him of the thousands of other slaves to purchase. Later, Batiatus tells his lanista to “watch the second from the right…. He has quality.” Marcellus (Charles McGraw) singles him out from the other slaves to challenge, asking his name and noting that he “might even be intelligent.” Helena and Claudia select him as one of the most beautiful of the gladiators. This theme of Spartacus’s bodily excellent reoccurs throughout the film. Virtue is externalized as physical fitness and beauty. Spartacus’s externalized virtue gives him the strong teeth that attract Batiatus, the beauty to attract Varinia, Helena, and Claudia (Joanna Barnes), and even the virility to impregnate Varinia. Despite her past as both prostitute and household slave, immoral Romans and gladiators prove impotent. Defying all probability, it is not until Spartacus lies with her that she conceives a child! This notion of bodily beauty as a reflection of inner virtue is not confined to Spartacus. Both Antoninus and Varinia share Spartacus’s morality, and both are physically very beautiful. Of course, Spartacus’s ability to lead is the most important of the fruits of externalized virtue. His position of leadership comes not as a result of circumstance, luck, or plotting, but simply happens, seemingly spontaneously, as a result of his presence. His virtue explicitly wins him the praise of the slaves when he argues with Crixus for lenient treatment of captured patricians. In this scene he seems to already have been the recognized leader, their praise not a vote of confidence, but merely a tribute of praise from his already-docile people. Instead, his leadership flows from his virtue—just as the camera and the Romans mark him out as different from the rest (one who has “quality”), so too the slaves recognize his superior virtue and respond with their automatic and unquestioning homage. But this homage is not the font of his leadership, it is merely an acknowledgement of that which already exists. Here, the film uses names with extraordinary cleverness. A comparison of Spartacus’s use of his name and the use of their own names by the Roman leaders reveals the difference between the sources of their power and leadership. From the beg-inning of the film, Spartacus is constantly speaking his own name. He is asked his name by Batiatus within the first few minutes of film, and speaks it. The other gladiators do not speak their names, Draba (Woody Strode) even refusing to do so when asked. Their names are spoken for them—by Spartacus, by their masters, by other slaves. The same holds true for the Roman leaders. Crassus (and Gracchus also, though he is not as important in opposition to Spartacus in the structure of the film) only speaks his name once during the entire film, and this is met with a gobbet of spit from a Spartacus unimpressed. Crassus pronounces his name to enforce his power over Spartacus, but fails. Pronouncing one’s name operates in the film as an act of empowerment, an act of grasping true authority. The modifier ‘true’ is important here, because (as we shall see below) the film makes a distinction between the true authority Spartacus exercises and the false authority of Crassus. Crassus does not pronounce his own name. It is pronounced by others: senators, soldiers, and sycophants all constantly cry “Hail Crassus!”; Batiatus greets him and acknowledges his authority by rattling off a list of all Crassus’ ancestors and Crassus’ full name—but this is not enough to grant true authority. The acknowledgement of others is not the source of true authority. True authority (like bodily beauty) comes from within, from inner virtue, and this inner virtue is transformed into external authority by speaking one’s own name. The name crosses the limen of the internal and the external, and bears superiority from the inside (virtue) to the outside (authority). Spartacus constantly states his name, constantly transforms virtue into authority, and constantly confirms the premise of the PWE, that one’s station in the world flows directly from one’s virtuousness. Here, having men-tioned the distinction between false and true authority, we should consider Spartacus’ techn-iques of universal-ization. When pres-enting masses of people, the film is careful to distinguish between those which are meant to represent the whole of humanity (the audience included), and those which are meant to represent only a select subset of the populace. When the Roman legions march forth, they do so in silence, watched only by Crassus and Antoninus. When the slave army marches through Metapontum, they are cheered by the entire population of men, women, and children. When the Romans fight, their army is male, faceless and nameless, automatic and mechanistic6. When Spartacus fights, his army is composed of men and women, it has faces and leaders and individuals. When Crassus addresses Rome before the final battle, his audience is entirely male, between the ages of 30 and 60. When Spartacus addresses the slaves, he speaks to infants, children, adults, and elders of both sexes and all nations. Here the way the film uses sex is quite important. It should be noted that there are only two Roman women (Helena and Claudia) in the entire film, and they appear only briefly and vanish quickly. Once they depart, not a single Roman woman appears—Rome is entirely male. It is also entirely either white or black haired; entirely clothed in red and white; entirely of medium height; and entirely between the ages of 30 and 60. Spartacus’s slaves, on the other hand, are both male and female, even during battle. They are short and tall, of all ages (including newborns and very elder elders), of all hair colors, from all nations, and dressed in all colors.7 We are meant to distinguish between the part and the whole. The diversity of the slaves is meant to convince us that this group stands for all of humanity, making Spartacus’s authority true authority—that is, universal authority. Homogenous crowds of Romans, no matter how big (and they are generally quite small), never can stand for all of humanity, so Crassus’s authority is false authority, limited authority. And it is this universalization which is the key to Spartacus’s seduction. The universalized crowds of slaves thronging to and dying for their leader—thronging to and dying for the incarnation of the Protestant Work Ethic—include all mankind, include the audience as well as the characters. We join with the universal crowd in adulation and wonder, and submit to the authority of this one whose power springs from his virtue. We submit as well to the assumptions he bears with him, that worldly power is the outward sign of internal superiority. The film’s emphasis on the struggle between Roman relativism, slave barbarism, and Christian virtue makes virtue itself the engine of Spartacus’s rise. Its insistence that external power is the result of internal virtue is confirmed and proclaimed by its universalized bodies that attempt to sweep up the audience as well. Trumbo speaks of Spartacus’s crucifixion as though Spartacus were a new Christ, insisting “that the spirit and intellect of Spartacus in his moment of defeat and moral agony rose so far above himself that it symbolized the spirit and intellect of the whole murdered slave community” (32). And perhaps Spartacus does symbolize the “spirit and intellect” of the slaves, but we should be poor critics indeed to be seduced by this pseudo-Christ without seriously considering the social and economic assumptions he bears in tow. Footnotes 2 Stanley Kubrick, 1960—throughout I shall refer to the 1991 restored version. 3 Cooper, Duncan. “Who Killed Spartacus?” Cineaste. 1991:18.
18-27. Henceforth all references will be made parenthetically. 5 Note also that all of the film’s subjective shots are filmed from Spartacus’ point of view. 6 See, for example, the strikingly emotionless faces of the soldiers present when Crassus is elected consul; also, the sound of marching legions is not the tramping or shouting of men, but rather the clinking of metal, as if the army is composed of automatons instead of men. 7 Notably lacking here is racial diversity. The film’s sole black, Draba, is quickly killed, and not replaced.
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