The World of Lyric

Abstract

Chapter 1 offers a sketch of lyric geography. It positions the poetic activities and movements of the lyric poets on a map of Greece and Magna Graecia, and presents lyric poetry in its environment of composition and performance. The first part places lyric poetry in its local and pan-Hellenic contexts, and takes into account the environment within which local, wandering, and pan-Hellenic lyric poets moved, and the patrons and communities for which they composed, foregrounding the song-types that prevail in certain periods and areas. The second part addresses the paradoxical status of Athens as the city that did not produce lyric, but still helped preserve it. Athens imports lyric poets for its festivals, and the discussion explores the manner in which non-Athenian lyric poets were chosen to participate in Athenian festivals and calls attention to the paradoxical absence from official Athenian records of the names of victorious lyric poets.