SOURCE: "Erichto and Her Universe" in Momentary Monsters: Lucan and His Heroes, Cornell University Press, 1987, pp. 1-33.

In the following excerpt, Johnson contends that the Pharsalia reflects Lucan's view of the universe as a discordant machine bent on self-destruction.

             But when the planets
 In evil mixture to disorder wander,
 What plagues, and what portents, what
  mutiny,
 What raging of the sea, shaking of earth,
 Commotion in the winds, frights, changes,
  horrors,
 Divert and crack, rend and deracinate
 The unity and married calm of states
 Quite from their fixture?
 Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida

1. This outrageous, sour, impossible poem—why, except to still the rumblings of antiquarian appetites—why should we bother with it at all? The Pharsalia has no hero, or too many. Its narrative is obscure, irritating, botched. It flouts epic conventions, or ignores them, or bungles them. Its central themes are scrambled by radical ambivalence of thought...