Source A: Petronius, Satyricon 49-50
'Without delay the cook was stripped and stood miserably between two torturers. But everyone began to plead for him: "It happens," they said; "please let him off; if he ever does it again, none of us will speak up for him." ... But Trimalchio's face relaxed into a grin. "Well then," he said, "since you have such a bad memory, gut it here in front of us." The cook put his tunic back on, grabbed a knife and cut into the pig's belly here and there with a nervous hand. At once, as the cuts widened under the weight, out tumbled sausages and black puddings. The slaves applauded this trick and shouted, "Long live Gaius!" The cook was honoured with a drink and a silver crown.'
How far does the humour of the Dinner with Trimalchio depend on surprise and trickery? Use Source A as a starting point and your own knowledge of the prescribed passages.
Model answer
Surprise and trickery are an important source of humour in the Dinner with Trimalchio, and they provide its most memorable moments, but much of the comedy also comes from Trimalchio's character, his ignorance and the narrator's irony.
Source A shows how carefully a trick is staged. The cook is stripped and stands 'between two torturers', so the guests believe he will be flogged and beg for him. Then Trimalchio's face 'relaxed into a grin', the cook slits the pig, and sausages and black puddings 'tumbled out'. The slaves applaud 'this trick' and the cook is rewarded with a silver crown. The humour depends on the audience being fooled, and Encolpius, who had muttered to Agamemnon that he would not forgive a slave who forgot to gut even a fish, looks especially foolish.
Other episodes work in the same way. Encolpius falls over when he sees the painted guard-dog, nearly throws away his pastry egg because he thinks it contains a chick, and finds a fig-pecker in peppered yolk instead. Even the starters contain a visual trick, with damsons and pomegranate seeds placed under the grill to look like glowing coals. The dinner is like a theatre show in which Trimalchio is the producer.
However, a great deal of the humour has nothing to do with surprise. Trimalchio's vulgar display is funny in itself: his name and the weight of the silver engraved on the dishes, the senator's stripe on his napkin, and gold coins used as counters. His ignorance is another source, as when he says he alone owns genuine Corinthian bronze because his dealer is called Corinthus, and that Hannibal captured Troy. The gossip of Encolpius' neighbour, with its exaggerations about estates 'as far as kites can fly' and Fortunata measuring money 'by the bushel', is comic because of its lively, coarse language. Encolpius' sarcasm, as in 'the most refined touch of all', adds a further layer.
Overall, surprise and trickery are a major part of the humour and give the dinner its theatrical shape, but they are funny largely because they reveal Trimalchio's love of showing off; the deeper comedy comes from character and social satire.
Explanation
A strong answer analyses the staging of the pig trick, links it to other surprises (the painted dog, the pastry eggs) and then weighs them against other sources of humour: vulgarity, ignorance, gossip and narration. The judgement should explain the relationship between the tricks and Trimalchio's character. Narrating the tricks without evaluation stays in Level 2.
