Quintus Smyrnaeus' Posthomerica: Engaging Homer in Late Antiquity

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BRILL, May 10, 2012 - Literary Criticism - 224 pages
Quintus Smyrnaeus' Posthomerica (3rd century C.E.), the 14 book Greek epic on the Trojan War, is a text which has traditionally been overlooked in the main canon of Classical authors, and in fact until only recently has been largely ignored as a literary work. This book, the first monograph in English on the poem since 1904, examines the Posthomerica s close relationship with the Homeric epics, with a focus on the originality and Late Antique interpretative bias of Quintus in his readings and emulation of Homer. The study deals specifically with three separate aspects of poetics, and their Homeric intertextuality: ecphrasis, gnomai, and similes, and their role within the poem s narrative strategies, themes, and aims.
 

Contents

Introduction
1
Being Homer Later
7
Chapter Two Ecphrasis and the Emblems of the Past
39
Chapter Three Speaking Morality through Gnomai
87
Chapter Four Posthomeric Similes Homeric Likenesses
125

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About the author (2012)

Calum A. Maciver, PhD (2009) in Classics, University of Edinburgh, is currently lecturer in Greek at the University of Leeds. He has published a number of articles on Later Greek Hexameter poetry, especially Quintus Smyrnaeus.

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