When the text becomes the teller : Apuleius and the Metamorphoses

In Apuleius' Metamorphoses, the text speaks, introducing itself to its audience in its own voice. When the text tells the audience to ask the question "Who is this?" it responds by giving a "family" history and linguistic genealogy. While the text highlights storytelling through its plot and situations, it also participates in storytelling, making itself the primary agent of transmission. During a time when ancient Rome highlighted the performances of literary works in order to offer authorized interpretations (that is, the performance of the text would indicate to the audience how to understand it), Apuleius' text makes itself the performer and subordinates the audience to itself. This new relationship of audience to text that was created by a new use of storytelling allowed for the exhibition of and creation of a counter-culture that permitted imperial critique during the Age of the Antonines./