Popular Culture
After the release of the movie Gladiator sales of the Meditations rose sharply, and as Claudius Maximus is identified only by the name "Maximus" in the very first book of the Meditations, this apparently led some to believe there might have been a connection between the Maximus of the Meditations and the Maximus Decimus Meridius of Gladiator. No documentation appears to back this up however. Rather, the original name of the movie's main character was Narcissus, identifying him with the gladiator who is believed to have ended Emperor Commodus' life. Later versions of the character incorporated other classical historical influences however there seems to be no connection between Claudius Maximus of the Meditations and the Maximus of Gladiator.
Read more about this topic: Claudius Maximus
Famous quotes containing the words popular culture, popular and/or culture:
“Popular culture entered my life as Shirley Temple, who was exactly my age and wrote a letter in the newspapers telling how her mother fixed spinach for her, with lots of butter.... I was impressed by Shirley Temple as a little girl my age who had power: she could write a piece for the newspapers and have it printed in her own handwriting.”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)
“Lawyers are necessary in a community. Some of you ... take a different view; but as I am a member of that legal profession, or was at one time, and have only lost standing in it to become a politician, I still retain the pride of the profession. And I still insist that it is the law and the lawyer that make popular government under a written constitution and written statutes possible.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)
“Anthropologists have found that around the world whatever is considered “men’s work” is almost universally given higher status than “women’s work.” If in one culture it is men who build houses and women who make baskets, then that culture will see house-building as more important. In another culture, perhaps right next door, the reverse may be true, and basket- weaving will have higher social status than house-building.”
—Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen. Excerpted from, Gender Grace: Love, Work, and Parenting in a Changing World (1990)