Classical Reception in Lil Nas X with Yentl Love

We sit down with Yentl Love to talk all about classical reception in Lil Nas X’s 2021 music video for ‘Call Me By Your Name’. Yentl Love is the famous Queer Classicist and we recommend checking out her blog for accessible analysis of the ancient world. We are thrilled to have Yentl return to the show – you may remember her from the insightful conversation we had about the reception of Cleopatra.

Lil Nas X has enjoyed great success with his debut album Montero and we were keen to learn more about how he utilised allusions to the ancient world to drive conversations about black identity and queerness as well as to complicate ideas about the heroic and how we might derive meaning when we analyse the past.

It’s definitely worth watching the music video before getting into the episode itself!

The ancient world has a wealth of symbolism and allusion that has built up and developed over time through the use and reuse of imagery and ideas and this conversation really just touches some of the potentials.

Special Episode – Classical Reception in Lil Nas X with Yentl Love

The Ideal Man

What makes the ideal man? Lil Nas X poses the question with a visual allusion to Doryphoros, the famous sculpture by the Greek Polykleitos, which is thought to represent the physical ideal in ancient Greek culture. Doryphoros was a favoured subjected in later Roman sculpture as well.

Doryphoros from Pompeii – A Roman marble reimagining of a Greek sculpture by Polykeitos.
Now in the MAN Napoli.

Architectural Influences

The opening of the music video provides a sweeping vista that on the surface has the appearance of paradise but is dotted with ruined buildings and structures. What could this mean? We ask Yentl’s perspective.

Still from ‘Call Me By your Name’ showing a Doric Temple in the foreground and an Aqueduct in the background

Just a regular symposium…

Famously, Plato’s Symposium gets a shout out in ‘Call me By Your Name’ with a quotation that roughly translates as “After the division the two parts of man, each desiring his other half…” We consider the significance of this phrase in context and enjoy the fact that every so often someone uses an ancient language in a modern setting!

Still from ‘Call Me By Your Name’ Ancient Greek from Plato’s Symposium on the Tree of Knowledge

I like my hair like I like my Flavians!

As the music video progresses, we see Lil Nas X shift scenes to an arena. The hairstyles on display in this scene recall the gravity defying hair styles favoured by the Flavian dynasty.

Still from ‘Call Me By Your Name’ showing hairstyles echoing the Flavians

For comparison, consider the hair style of the portrait bust below. Although the identity of the subject is not certain, this piece is often identified as Julia Titi, the daughter of the Flavian emperor Titus. She was reputed to be a great beauty, but it’s the very high ringlets that win the day here!

Portrait bust of a young woman with an extremely high hair style made of ringlets.
Capitoline Museum. Source: Tumblr

Things to listen out for

• Lizzo’s music video for ‘Rumors’
• Katabasis – a traditional heroic descent to the Underworld
• Nero taking a man as wife and also being a bride
• The sacred band of Thebes
• Hadrian and Antinous
• Correction – Dr G meant Patroklos not Paterculus when discussing Achilles!

Black women writers on Medusa

Interested in learning more about the writers mentioned in this episode? Consider the following:

• Dorothea Smartt on Medusa
• Listen to Dorothea perform poems from her catalogue here
• Shara McCallum’s “The Madwoman as Rasta Medusa”

Sound Credits

Our music was composed by Bettina Joy de Guzman.

Still from ‘Call Me By your Name’ Music Video by Lil Nas X.
Notes that the video was directed by Tanu Muino and Lil Nas X, song produced by D. Baptiste, D. Biral, O. Fedi, R. Lenzo.

Automated Transcript

Lightly edited for clarity.

Dr Rad 0:12
Welcome to The Partial Historians.

Dr G 0:15
We explore all the details of ancient Rome.

Dr Rad 0:20
Everything from political scandals to love affairs, the battles waged, and when citizens turn against each other. I’m Dr. Rad.

Dr G 0:30
And I’m Dr. G. We consider Rome as the Roman saw it by reading different ancient authors and comparing their accounts.

Dr Rad 0:41
Join us as we trace the journey of Rome from the founding of the city.

Dr G 0:57
Hello and welcome to a brand new episode of The Partial Historians. I’m one of your hosts, Dr. G.

Dr Rad 1:06
And I am Dr. Rad.

Dr G 1:08
And we are thrilled to be joined today by Yentl Love, who is working on her PhD at Potsdam University and is universally famous for her blog as The Queer Classicist. Thank you so much for joining us.

Yentl 1:26
Thank you so much for having me. Yeah, I’m so glad to be back chatting to you more.

Dr Rad 1:31
So we’re very excited because we’re discussing something extremely cool. And actually, quite frankly, a little out of our comfort zone today.

Dr G 1:41
Yeah, look, I don’t think we are known as paragons of popular music. Nevertheless, we were super fascinated to see the rise. And the continued rise, I think of Lil Nas X, and what he is doing with his musical journey. And it is a thrill to sit down today with anto to talk about one specific music video that has come through and his debut album, and that is Montero “Call Me By Your Name”.

Dr Rad 2:09
So let’s kick it off with our first question. So let’s think about maybe classical reception more broadly. Because of course, the video clip is kind of what’s intrigued us all, I think with its imagery and whatnot. So classical reception can obviously take many forms. I personally like the film side of things, but can you talk us through what the phrase classical reception means to you?

Yentl 2:30
So yeah, I mean, as you said, this is a really, really broad field that we’re talking about, and it encompasses so much within it. On its most basic level, I’d say that when we are talking about classical reception, we’re kind of considering how the classical world so really looking at ancient Greece and Rome, and how it has been received and portrayed or represented across time. So this can be anything from an architecture, when we see buildings deliberately kind of evoking this ancient Greco Roman kind of period. Or in literature, like, famously Madeline Miller’s “Song of Achilles”, or in music, like Lizzo’s music video for “Rumors”, and we’re going to talk about Lil Nas X’s music video. And as well as like, where we see these parts of ancient history depicted. I think another big part of classical reception is thinking, why do we see these particular parts down? Why is there this use of like Greek and Roman material? What is the specific message that the work of reception is trying to put through? Through using it? But yeah, the field really is just massively wide. And what I really like about it is I think that all uses of classical reception are equally valid and equally worthy of study, like a piece of fanfiction about, like Mark Antony and Augustus, could be discussed in like just as much detail as like the architecture of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin. All of this is just different types of classical reception.

Dr G 4:08
Yeah, there’s really a wide array of uses and reuses of ancient imagery. And when we’re talking about classical reception, hinting back at particularly Greece and Rome are though I imagine at some point, we’re also going to see in our lifetimes, the interrogation of classical in a more robust way, and I’m looking forward to seeing how that goes. But taking off from where we’re starting with, like this idea of classical reception in modern culture, for a little bit of context for our listeners out there who spend all ages and all interests, who is Lil Nas X?

Yentl 4:43
Okay, so Lil Nas X is a stage name for Montero Lamar Hill. He is a black, queer American rapper and singer songwriter, and I think probably he’s most famous for his song “Old Town Road”, but then he released his first studio album “Montero” in 2021. And yeah, the music video we’re going to be talking about is from one of the songs on that debut album.

Dr Rad 5:11
Absolutely. I mean, I had never heard of it before. I know everyone’s gonna be really shocked that I don’t follow rap. In any, you know, I really stopped listening after “Shoop”. And so I’m really glad that I had my attention directed towards his music video, because it is really fascinating. And we’re not the only ones to be interested in it. Because there’s some really intriguing representations and expressions of queerness. And the ways that the music video explores allusions to the ancient world. So what are some of the significant images and symbols that come through in the music video?

Yentl 5:47
So one of the things that’s like, most interesting, I think about the video is the way it forms almost like a long heroic art are a long narrative around this