Poet, Public, and Performance in Ancient Greece

Abstract

Poetry in archaic and classical Greece was a practical art that arose from specific social or political circumstances. The interpretation of a poem or dramatic work must therefore be viewed in context of its performance. In Poetry, Public, and Performance in Ancient Greece, Lowell Edmunds and Robert W. Wallace bring together a distinguished group of contributors to reconstruct context of a wide array of works, including epic, tragedy, lyric, elegy, and proverb. Analyzing passage in Odyssey in which a collective delirium comes over suitors, Giulio Guidorizzi reveals how poet describes a scene that lies outside narrative themes and diction of epic. Antonio Aloni offers a reading of Simonides' elegy for Greeks who fell at Plataea. Lowell Edmunds interprets so-called seal of Theognis as lying on a borderline between performed and textual. Taking up proverbs, maxims, and apothegms, Joseph Russo examines the of wisdom. Charles Segal focuses on unusual role played by chorus in Euripides' Bacchae. Reading plot of Euripides' Ion, Thomas Cole concludes that task of constructing meaning of play is to some extent delegated to public. Robert Wallace describes performance of Athenian audience and provides a catalog of good and bad behavior: whistling, shouting, and throwing objects of every kind. Finally, Maria Grazia Bonanno stresses importance of in lyric poetry.