{"id":1729,"date":"2015-08-10T22:26:50","date_gmt":"2015-08-10T22:26:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.rutgers.edu\/alcoholstudies-archives\/?p=1729"},"modified":"2021-03-09T00:45:46","modified_gmt":"2021-03-09T00:45:46","slug":"bunkys-pantheon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.rutgers.edu\/alcoholstudies-archives\/bunkys-pantheon\/","title":{"rendered":"Bunky’s Pantheon"},"content":{"rendered":"

The study of alcoholism does not just reward but practically demands an interdisciplinary approach, a capacity to navigate and synthesize medical science, psychology, sociology, and more. In this way we might say it takes after its father: E. M. Jellinek, a polyglot and polymath who delighted in jumping between registers of meaning\u2013\u2013a fascination apparent in not just his scholarly work but also his private amusements. A recently uncovered typewritten and hand-corrected short document, titled \u201cWho Was Who in Greek Mythology,\u201d shows off his classical learning, linguistic dexterity, and inventive sense of humor, and offers some fascinating traces of his academic pursuits and personal life.<\/p>\n

Jellinek, or \u201cBunky,\u201d entertains himself throughout this biographical-dictionary-cum-gossip-column by retelling classical legends in contemporary language. Aphrodite is a \u201cbeautiful doll,\u201d while Athena lacked \u201csex appeal\u201d; Hermes had \u201ca terrific racket\u201d as god of commerce and of thieves, while Zeus was \u201cchief of all the Olympic bigshots.\u201d He has fun modernizing myth: Chiron founds a \u201cprep school\u201d for heroes; the Argonauts and their descendants form a snobbish \u201cMayflower Society\u201d-esque club; Orpheus becomes an ancient Elvis, \u201cfirst of the crooners,\u201d and is \u201ctorn to pieces by Thracian teenagers\u201d caught up \u201cin a wild scramble for autographs.\u201d Jellinek seems to enjoy wordplay above all. In his neoclassical neologisms Medea becomes \u201cJason\u2019s argonaughty mistress,\u201d while Poseidon is \u201ctridentified as a sea god.\u201d In a memorable flourish of tautology, Hera is described as \u201ca handsome dame of Junoesque stature.\u201d This philological fun extends to some inventive false etymologies. Helios, Jellinek writes with mock authority, \u201cwas probably of Basque origin, as Halieia, the name of his chief festival, seems to be the Greek mispronunciation of the Basque jai alai.\u201d The apex of this humor is probably the entry for the pastoral deity Pan, who \u201cused to be a god (son of Hermes) but, because of his vulgar habits, was demoted to the rank of a prefix (e.g., in pantheon and pancake).\u201d Jellinek seems to have found his satyr-satire endlessly funny; manuscript revisions add \u201cpants\u201d and [pan]-\u201cdemonium\u201d to the list of derivatives.<\/p>\n

\"text<\/a>Jellinek\u2019s jokes also show off his professional knowledge. He includes \u201cErysipelas\u201d in his list, which \u201cwould have made a wonderful name for a mythological figure\u201d but unfortunately \u201cwas preempted by the Committee for the International List of Diseases and Causes of Deaths.\u201d He has particular fun with the namesakes of Freudian concepts. Narcissus is described as \u201can entirely insignificant figure in Greek mythology who rose to sudden fame in the twentieth century, A.D., when a high-power press agent sneaked him into psychoanalytic terminology,\u201d and likewise Psyche \u201cplays a greater role in the modern U.S.A. than she did in ancient Greece.\u201d A manuscript note to the latter entry claims that \u201cshe is worshipped in secret temples by psychiatrists and psychologists, but none of them will admit ever having met her\u201d\u2013\u2013perhaps a playful jab at the cultish mysticism of some strains of Freudian orthodoxy. In a parallel vein of humor, Jellinek delights in diagnosing classical figures with modern disorders. Thus Persephone \u201cdeveloped involutional melancholia\u201d in the underworld, while for Dionysus \u201cthe most appropriate psychiatric label seems to be \u2018manic-depressive.\u2019\u201d Jellinek\u2019s field of expertise shows up in a couple of these creative anachronisms. \u201cHera hated Dionysus so intensely that out of opposition to him she founded the antialcoholic movement,\u201d he writes, \u201crecently and much belatedly adopted by M. Mendes-France.\u201d Interestingly, he crossed out the suffix \u201c-ic\u201d in manuscript. Perhaps Jellinek was wary of implying that true alcoholism could be said to exist in antiquity; after all, in The Disease Concept of Alcoholism<\/em> he writes that habitual individual drinking purely for the purposes of intoxication (\u201cutilitarian\u201d as opposed to \u201critual drinking\u201d) \u201cis made possible only through advances in the techniques of brewing beers and fermentation of wines, preservation and storage of the beverages, distribution facilities (the tavern, transportation, etc.), and through lower cost of the commodity\u201d (p. 151). He has no qualms about the potential historical pitfall, however, when it\u2019s unmistakably marked as part of the joke, like the \u201cAlcoolicoi Anonymoi\u201d meetings that Helios must attend in order to regain his solar chariot license.<\/p>\n

The last entry of the piece, for Zeus, comes to seem almost like a mythic autobiography. Jellinek\u2019s Zeus is a jovial trickster and true chameleon who \u201ccould impersonate any person and inanimate any animal,\u201d not unlike the man himself. The two also share a knack for reinvention. According to Jellinek, \u201cJupiter frequently issued declarations to the effect that he was not identical with Zeus and he repudiated paternity claims and damage suits for alienation of affection which Zeus wanted to palm off on him.\u201d Is the move from Greek to Roman mythology a genuine change of identity, or a clever ruse to shake off familial and financial obligations? Much like Jellinek\u2019s own convoluted migrations and rechristenings, it\u2019s hard to say for sure.<\/p>\n

\u2013Nick Allred<\/em><\/p>\n

References<\/strong><\/p>\n