The Ancient Roman symbol of life’s precariousness was a butterfly balanced on a skull balanced on a wheel and the story of Peplum thoroughly proves it. Acclaimed French graphic novelist Blutch freely adapts Petronius Arbiter’s Satyricon (one of the first “novels” in recorded history) into a story full of stoicism and sloth, sex and death, whimsy and tragedy, all gorgeously rendered. A cold, starving youth takes a dead nobleman’s name and travels across the Empire encountering all manner of misadventures. Is it all a cosmic joke or an outcome entirely of his own making? You decide.