I write below, in this somewhat lengthy series of 3 prose-poems, brief sketches of three Hannibals. They are Hannibals whom I came to know about in some detail in the last two decades, 1994 to 2014, from the age of 50 to 70. This 20 year period involved the last 5 years of my working life as a teacher-lecturer and extensive commitments in Baha'i administration, as well as the first 15 years of my retirement from FT, PT and most volunteer-work, after a 50 year student-and-employment life: 1949 to 1999.

1. HANNIBAL
I write below, in this somewhat lengthy series of 3 prose-poems, brief
sketches of three Hannibals. They are Hannibals whom I came to
know about in some detail in the last two decades, 1994 to 2014, from
the age of 50 to 70. This 20 year period involved the last 5 years of
my working life as a teacher-lecturer and extensive commitments in
Baha'i administration, as well as the first 15 years of my retirement
from FT, PT and most volunteer-work, after a 50 year student-and-
employment life: 1949 to 1999.
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Part 1:
The first Hannibal was a Hannibal Lecter, a fictional character in a
series of suspense novels by Thomas Harris. Lecter was first
introduced in Harris's 1981 thriller novel, Red Dragon. Lecter was a
brilliant psychiatrist and a cannibalistic serial killer in this novel.
This novel and its sequel, The Silence of the Lambs, featured Lecter
as one of the primary antagonists. In the third novel, Hannibal,
Lecter becomes a protagonist. His role is as an anti-hero in the fourth
novel, Hannibal Rising. This novel explores Lecter's childhood and
his development into a serial killer.
Brian Cox, an Emmy award-winning actor, first came to attention in
the early 1970s with performances in numerous television films. His
first big break was as Dr Hannibal Lecter in the film Manhunter.
Manhunter was a 1986 American crime thriller film based on that
Harris's Red Dragon. I have never written about that Brian Cox
before. Nor have I written about the Brian Cox who has drunk cheap
wine, methylated spirits and aftershave, and who has been in some of
what the sociologist Irving Goffman called total institutions: jails,
lockups, and padded cells.1
Until that particular Cox was 49, he was a
self-confessed hopeless alcoholic. By 2010 he was a man with a
mission. But this is not the Brian Cox I have written about from time
to time in several prose-poems.
Part 1.1:

2. The Brian Cox at the centre of some of my little literary pieces was
interviewed in Australia by Andrew Denton in September 2008. In
September 2010 Cox appeared Downunder on SBS TV. Cox is a
particle physicist and a Royal Society University Research Fellow. He
is best known to the public in the UK and around the world as the
presenter of a number of science programmes for the BBC. In March-
April 2010 Cox presented a five part BBC television series entitled
Wonders of the Solar System. It was a series that combined
experiential adventuring with computer graphics to help explain our
nearest neighbours in space.
I‟m sure there are now millions of viewers like myself who now love
Brian Cox. He bridges the gap between our childish sense of wonder
and a rather more professional grasp of the scale of things, a
professional grasp that I will certainly never have.-Ron Price with
thanks to 1
Wikipedia; Erving Goffman(1922-1982) was a Canadian-
born sociologist and writer, considered "the most influential
American sociologist of the twentieth century". In 2007 he was listed
by The Times Higher Education Guide as the sixth most-cited author
in the humanities and social sciences, behind Anthony Giddens and
ahead of Jürgen Habermas.
Part 2:
The second Hannibal is one I have written about briefly in connection
with my studies of Roman history. The social breakdown of Hellenic
society was first manifest in what historian Arnold Toynbee called a
„Time of Troubles.‟ That time began with the Peloponnesian
War(431-404 BC), a war I studied and taught in a Greek history
course. It was a Time of Troubles, says Toynbee, that lasted for 400
years.
Toynbee sites several examples of a new spirit of atrocity that took
place during the Peloponnesian War. These atrocities were “mortal
blows,” “suicidal manias” that Hellenic society inflicted on itself.1
They were the first signs of the breakdown of that civilization, argues

3. Toynbee. Toynbee, like all historians, offers us a particular
interpretation of history.
Part 2.1:
In our time, suicidal manias and mortal blows have been inflicted on
our society, our civilization, it could be argued. We did this in the
years 1914 to 1945: two world wars, the holocaust, the Gulag and it
may be that this „Time of Troubles‟ and their mortal blows will go on.
The tempest certainly shows no signs of abating a century after its
theoretical start in 1914. Tonight I watched a two hour TV special on
Hannibal.2
I wondered what the equivalent of this Hannibalic war was
in our modern age using the Toynbean paradigm. -Ron Price with
thanks to 1
Arnold Toynbee, A Study of History, Vol.4, OUP,
1962(1939), p.63; and 2
“Hannibal: Rome‟s Worst Nightmare,”
Southern Cross TV, 8:30-10:30 p.m., April 13th
2006.
Rome was conquering all,
conquering that moribund
world; so Toynbee put it in
his 11 volumes of History.1
A city state, the centre of emerging
empire, a Greek institution grafted
onto a traditional rural culture and
the world getting more complex.
And so it is in our westernizing
world, our spiritually moribund
nation state centre of an emerging
global society.The world getting
more and more & more complex.
Just as Hannibal shook Rome to its
boots, so our world as been shaken
by a catalogue of horrors and a ruin
whose magnitude is immeasurable.

4. And so an empire, a one world, came
into being and a Republic gave way2
to Empire as our world will give way
to world Order, but the great, endless
modern puzzle, jig-saw like, has most of
its pieces missing in our post-modernity.
1
Arnold Toynbee, A Study of History, Volumes 1 to 11, Oxford UP,
1962.
2
Keith Richardson, Daggers in the Forum: The Revolutionary
Lives and Violent Times of the Gracchi Brothers, Cassell, London,
1976, p. xi.
Part 3:
The third Hannibal who came into my print and electronic media life
in the last 20 years was the Hannibal Lecter of The Silence of the
Lambs. The Silence of the Lambs was a 1991 American thriller film
that blended elements of both crime and horror genres. Starring Jodie
Foster and Anthony Hopkins, the film is based on a Thomas Harris
1988 novel with the same name. The novel was Harris's second to
feature Hannibal Lecter, a brilliant psychiatrist and cannibalistic
serial killer.
Lecter was given the honour of being the number one 'film-villain' of
all time by The American Film Institute. The American Film Institute
also placed the escape scene in this film, a scene with Hannibal
Lecter, as 7th in The 100 Scariest Movie Moments.
In 2011, ABC aired a prime-time special, Best in Film: The Greatest
Movies of Our Time. It counted down the best films chosen by fans
based on results of a poll conducted by ABC and People magazine.
The Silence of the Lambs was selected as the No. 1 Best Suspense
Thriller, and Dr Hannibal Lecter was selected as the No. 4 'Greatest
Film Character.'
Part 3.1:

5. In the film, Clarice Starling, a young U.S. FBI trainee, seeks the
advice of the imprisoned Dr Lecter to apprehend another serial killer,
known only as "Buffalo Bill". The Silence of the Lambs was released
on 14 February 1991, as I was just beginning to eye my retirement
from FT work and also my life as a poet and publisher.
It was only the third in film history to win Academy Awards in all
the top five categories: Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Actress, and
Best Writing. It is also the first Best Picture winner widely considered
to be a horror film, and only the second such film to be nominated in
the category, after The Exorcist in 1973. In 1973 I was hired to teach
in one of Australia's Colleges of Advanced Education and my study of
film had just begun.
The Silence of the Lambs is considered "culturally, historically or
aesthetically" significant by the U.S. Library of Congress and was
selected to be preserved in the National Film Registry in 2011. To
those who dislike horror films, I'm sure this would come as a surprise.