Irrational panegyric in Augustan poetry

In offering praise the Augustan poets exaggerate, fantasize and lie; but they describe themselves as inspired and beyond reason — like the Sibyl in Aeneid 6 (affected by Apollo, but n.b. bacchatur uates). The paper touches on the physicality of the divine emperor, irrationality in geography and astronomy, and moments of incompetence and sarcasm, before ending with the mix of Bacchic ecstasy and Apolline command to be found in panegyrical Odes . It encourages reading that does not diminish the oddity of these exhibitions of irrationality: the poets draw attention to their lack of reason, they attribute their wildest excesses to gods and ghosts, and they set them in contexts that question the reasonableness of what is said.