The Reflections of Satire: Lucian and Peregrinus

The Death of Peregrinus is ostensibly an attack on the eponymous sham philosopher and holy man, but when one looks more closely at how this attack is constructed, other targets emerge. This article argues that Lucian carries out his satire in terms that lead the reader back to his own authorial persona and implicate him in the same desperate striving for fame. But Lucian is not simply undermining himself nihilistically; instead the work becomes a satire on the culture of agonistic display in which both figures were so deeply invested.