Converging truths : Euripides' Ion and the Athenian quest for self-definition /
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This book is a study of the Ion of Euripides. Produced in a period of intense political crisis at Athens in 412 BC, this play went to the heart of Athenian self-perception but also highlighted the violent divine grace of Apollo, the intense emotional suffering of Kreousa, and Ion's insistent search for truth despite divine concealment. Informed by recent scholarship on Athenian ethnicity, this study shows how autochthony (claim to being earthborn) and Ionianism (Ionian character of Athens) are conceptually related with Apollo, father of Ion and god of the Delphic oracle where the play is set. Through careful analysis of the political, psychological, religious and poetic aspects of the play and use of modern critical theory, the Ion emerges as a polyphonic work expressing different and converging truths.
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Revision of the author's thesis (Ph. D.)--University of London, 1996. :
1 online resource (xiv, 231 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 189-212) and index. :
9789004349988 :
0169-8958 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The mythic voice of Statius : power and politics in the Thebaid /
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This is the first thematic study of Statius' Thebaid to be published in monograph form in English in the past twenty years. It examines in detail the thematic design and intent of the Thebaid and considers the question of its contemporary relevance. The book focuses on the central theme of power - how it is exercised on the supernatural and human levels and the consequences of its pursuit and abuse in terms of the human condition. An ensuing discussion explores the political undercurrents of the epic. This discussion is in four main parts: (1) 'Use and Abuse of Supernatural Power'; (2) 'Pursuit and Abuse of Monarchal Power'; (3) 'Consequences of the Abuse of Power'; and (4) 'Political Relevance to Contemporary Rome'. The views expressed represent a fundamental departure from previous studies and constitute a critical reassessment of the Thebaid . The provision of translations makes the book accessible to the Latinless reader.
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1 online resource (xiv, 198 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 184-190) and indexes. :
9789004329416 :
0169-8958 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Three Aeginetan odes of Pindar : a commentary on Nemean V, Nemean III and Pythian VIII /
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A study of three epinicia of Pindar, which have in common that they celebrate victories of Aeginetan athletes and that they respond to the contemporary political situation in Aegina and to circumstances of the victory. The primary objective of this book is to provide an interpretation of each of the three odes as meaningful, coherent works of the literary art. For each ode, it provides a commentary in which problems of text and interpretation are discussed in detail, a structural and metrical analysis, and an interpretative essay, in which the observations of detail are brought together in order to provide an answer to the question as to how the ode at hand could have functioned as a coherent, meaningful epinicion . The introduction addresses questions of method and provides a description of Pindar's style.
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1 online resource (xii, 721 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 667-698) and indexes. :
9789004351240 :
0169-8958 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Statius Thebaid VII : a commentary /
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The epic poem the Thebaid by P. Papinius Statius, written about AD 80 to 92, deals with the fraternal strife between Oedipus' sons Eteocles and Polynices for the mastery of Thebes. Book VII describes the forced march of the Seven and their arrival at Thebes, Jocasta's vain attempt at mediation and Amphiaraus' spectacular katabasis . This book is the first which deals with Thebaid VII since Barth (1664) and Amar andamp; Lemaire (1825-30). Apart from being a commentary in the philological sense, it examines in close detail the poet's mannered style and analyses the text as a system of intertextual references. In addition to Homer and Vergil, specific passages from Euripides, Lucan, Seneca and especially Valerius Flaccus were exploited by Statius to create his challenging imitation. The identification of these sources offers the key to interpret and evaluate the poet's artistic intentions. The Introduction discusses Statius' technique of multiple imitation. The information brought together has been made easily accessible by full indexes and an appendix listing the passages imitated by Statius.
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1 online resource (xlii, 462 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 424-434) and indexes. :
9789004329393 :
0169-8958 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The renewal of epic : responses to Homer in the Argonautica of Apollonius /
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The Renewal of Epic considers various modes of allusion to Homer in the Argonautica of Apollonius, dealing not only with similarities in phraseology but also with thematic and structural resemblances. After an introduction, two chapters discuss Apollonian techniques in treating repeated Homeric scenes: sacrifice, shipwreck, boxing and battle. The central section of the work considers the multiple links between the adventures of the Argonauts and Odysseus' wanderings. A final chapter explores Apollonius' innovative treatment of the divine, both generally and in particular scenes. The work shows convincingly that the Argonautica reproduces many of the patterns which have been found in the Iliad and Odyssey . It demonstrates the presence of allusion at every level in the poem, linking it to its predecesors and acting as an essential interpretative aid to the reader.
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1 online resource (x, 335 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 306-317) and indexes. :
9789004329775 :
0169-8958 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Commentaries on Pindar /
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This volume contains word-for-word commentaries on Pindar's Olympian Odes 3, 7, 12, 14. Emphasis is placed on the explanations of peculiarities of grammar and idiom, but due attention is paid to figures of style and problems of poetic structure. The interpretations proposed by the author - many of them which are new - are documented as fully, but at the same time as concisely, as possible. This documentation, which includes a critical examination of other views, has been made more easily accessible by detailed indexes. The poems discussed do not have special similarities or interrelationships. On the other hand, they may be considered representative of the poet's art. From this point of view, the present selection may serve as an introduction to the study of Pindar's work. Vol. II will contain commentaries on Olympians 1, 10, 11, Nemean 11, and Isthmian 2. A third volume on Pythians 1, 8, 10 is inteded to conclude the series.
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1 online resource (xi, 132 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789004328327 :
0169-8958 ; :
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Euripides' Bacchae : the play and its audience /
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The purpose of this book is to investigate what it was Euripides intended to convey to the theatre-going public of his day when he wrote his most exciting and most gruesome play, the Bacchae . The meanings which are to be attached to the action of a play are woven by an audience, both during and after the performance, into a single dramatic experience, labelled in this book as 'audience response'. After some introductory chapters dealing with the history of the interpretation of the Bacchae and with the theory of audience response, the main part of the book is devoted to a detailed analysis of the action of the play (chapters 4 and 5), and to a study of Dionysus in his various apects in Athenian life and in his appearances in earlier literature and on the tragic stage. The discussion of the choruses concentrates on the choruses' repeated utterances about cleverness and wisdom, which form the core of the Dionysian propaganda of the play. The most immediate results of this new interpretation of the Bacchae are that the widely-accepted view of Pentheus as a dark puritan, a man possessed by the Dionysian qualities of his divine opponent, proves to be untenable, and that that which in the past has been rightly called the overriding theme of the play - the god's epiphany - also contains the poet's most serious and ironical discussion of divinity and of man's treatment of it. The problems of the Greek text are given full discussion, mainly in the nots and appendices. In many cases new solutions are proposed; some new problems are however added.
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Originally presented as the author's thesis (doctoral)--Free University of Amsterdam. :
1 online resource (200 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 192-198) and index. :
9789004328051 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Blood and iron : stories and storytelling in Homer's Odyssey /
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Blood and Iron is an exploration of the role of gossip, rumor and storytelling in the society depicted in the Odyssey and in the real world in which the poem was performed. It includes extensive analysis of Homeric narrative technique, with particular attention to the way the singer creates tension in a largely traditional tale. Individual chapters treat discrete, generally very traditional literary and historical problems, including the significance of the term kleos , the presentation of Telemachos, the internal chronology of the poem, the nature of Homeric kingship, and the role of violence in the ancient Greek family. The book will be of importance for anyone interested in the literary content or storytelling technique of Homeric epic, as well for historians of the late Dark Ages.
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1 online resource (x, 260 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 241-252) and index. :
9789004329539 :
0169-8958 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
A commentary on Hesiod : Works and days, vv. l-382 /
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This is a word-for-word commentary on the first part (vv. 1-382) of Hesiod's Works and Days . Special attention has been paid to peculiarities of grammar and idiom, but also to figures of style and the poet's train of thought. All interpretations - many of them which are new - are documented as fully, but at the same time as concisely, as possible. This documentation, which will prove useful for the interpretation of many other texts, has been made more easily accesible by detailed indexes. Discussion of other views plays a considerable part in the commentary and will help the reader avoid a great number of minor and major misunderstandings. The commentary has been confined to the first part of the poem because this seemed to be more in need of a thorough explanation than the rest. It is also the most interesting part in so far as it forms a kind of manual of social morality. The basis concepts of this doctrine are carefully defined in the commentary, and their historical implications are briefly indicated.
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English and Greek. :
1 online resource (x, 190 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789004328211 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The reception of ancient Greece and Rome in children's literature : heroes and eagles /
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Greece and Rome have long featured in books for children and teens, whether through the genres of historical fiction, fantasy, mystery stories or mythological compendiums. These depictions and adaptations of the Ancient World have varied at different times, however, in accordance with changes in societies and cultures. This book investigates the varying receptions and ideological manipulations of the classical world in children's literature. Its subtitle, Heroes and Eagles , reflects the two most common ways in which this reception appears, namely in the forms of the portrayal of the Greek heroic world of classical mythology on the one hand, and of the Roman imperial presence on the other. Both of these are ideologically loaded approaches intended to educate the young reader.
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1 online resource (xiv, 344 pages) :
Includes blbliographical references and index. :
9789004298606 :
2212-9405 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Aristophanes and Athenian society of the early fourth century B.C. /
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The purposes of this short monograph are to identify and analyze the problems of Athenian society with which the last two extant plays of Aristophanes - the Ekklesiazousai and the Ploutos - are concerned, as well as to examine the playright's views on the essence of these problems and on attempts to find satisfactory solutions to them. The work contains an introduction and seven sections: 1. Historical Background; 2. Poverty: Symptoms, Ideas regarding Solutions and Criticisms of Ideas; 3. Poverty versus Riches; 4. The sources of the ''Communistic'' Ideas; 5. Misthos Ekklesiastikos ; 6. The Censure of Materialism; 7. Aristophanes and the ''Middle Road''. The author has attempted here to set forth both the value of Aristophanes' last plays as historical sources and the significance of their social message.
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1 online resource (46 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 44-46). :
9789004328167 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The Gorgon's severed head : studies in Alcestis, Electra, and Phoenissae /
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The Gorgon's Severed Head looks at three plays of Euripides, one early, one middle and one late in his career. Innovations in genre, in the use of the traditional stories, in the representation of women and of gender issues are present at every period. In all three plays characters are depicted creating themselves and each other. Chapter One on Alcestis looks at the artistry of the two main characters and is especially concerned with finding a role for Admetus, the play's most serious problem. The second chapter treats the physical displacement of the myth in Euripides' version of the Electra-Orestes story. A last section approaches the layers of time and space in Phoenissae .
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1 online resource (xv, 255 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789004329799 :
0169-8958 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.