wir Gares 419 Wiiting Arenas: Roman Authors and 5 Conclusion IL is time now to draw some conclusions from this brief survey of Roman writers? attitudes toward sport and spectacle, Roman writers did not portray chariot races and bloody shows in the arena as harmful to their society: On the contrary, most of them emphasized the positive clements, especially the educational value of the courage displayed in the arena, However, Roman writers also found deplorable some of the same acteristics that many modern spectators deem objectionable: the thirst for violence, the salacious and scandalous aspects associated with the celebrity culture engendered by these games, the deterioration of traditional morality, and the decadent tastes and ways of life fostered by sport and spectacle, Part of that criticism is undoubtedly associated. with the fact that the Roman writers discussed in this essay represented the attitude of Rome’s educated elite, who may have truly felt or at least feigned diggust for mass entertainment But the truth of the matter remains that forall their philosophical musings and haughty disdain, the testimonies show that the writers went to the shows as eagerly as the come mon people The best illustration of that fact isa story related by none other than St Augustine (354 480 cr) who, in accordance with his emerging Christian sensibilities, was horrified by the power of the arena. In his Ceufecdions Augustine's passionate recounting of his conversion to Christianity, he tells a story about his student, Alypius. ‘The latter upon. embarking on the study of law in Rome at first detested gladiacorial shows, only to be swvept away’ by the overpowering desire for them afier being loreibly dragged into an amphitheater by his friends. This is how Augustine describes Alypius’s eventual *eonver- sion” to Rome’s bloody pastime (Confisions6.3) cha For when he saw that blood, he immediately drank down the savagenness; indeed he did nut turn away, but fixed his eves on it; and unknowingly he drank up the Furies; he delighted in the wickedness of the fight and became inebriated ith bloodthirsty lust. He was no Longe tthe man who had come there but was one of the crowd to which he had come, indeed a true vomipamon to those who had brought him, What ebe is there 10 say? He looked on, he shouted, he was burning with excitement, he took away with him a madness that enticed him to come back. Augustine’s perception of his student’s “fall,” expressed with such unequivocal immediacy, clearly did not allow for any positive thoughts on the subject, ‘The concept of rirrisso dear to the pagan Roman writers was far from Augustine’s mind He found the proximity to the crowd and partaking in its lrenzy psychologically damaging and nothing less than a loss of his student’s soul, which was detiled by the sight of such cruelty. One has to wonder, however, ifthe writers of Roman antiquity wuly felt the same way even when they expressed their revulsion toward the games. Or perhaps like poor Alypius they were shutting their eyes and trying not tc Took at the arena all the while drinking in its roar and reveling in the irresistible energy oF its violence. And iF that is so, they were perhaps not much different from