Author: P. J. Heslin
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1139446738
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 371
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Book Description
Statius' Achilleid is a playful, witty, and open-ended epic in the manner of Ovid. As we follow Achilles' metamorphosis from wild boy to demure girl to lover to hero, the poet brilliantly illustrates a series of contrasting codes of behaviour: male and female, epic and elegiac. This first full-length study of the poem addresses not only the narrative itself, but also sets the myth of Achilles on Scyros within a broad interpretive framework. The exploration ranges from the reception of the Achilleid in Baroque opera to the anthropological parallels that have been adduced to explain Achilles' transvestism. The study's expansive approach, which includes Ovid and Ovidian reception, psychoanalytic perspectives and theorizations of gender in antiquity, makes it essential reading not only for students of Statius, but for students of Latin literature, and of gender in antiquity.
Author: C T Hadavas
Publisher: Independently Published
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 200
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Book Description
This book provides vocabulary and commentary to Statius' unfinished epic poem Achilleid ("[The book or story] of Achilles"), which was intended to tell the life of the hero Achilles from his youth to his death at Troy. The one book and part of a second that survive (a total of 1,128 lines) recount Achilles' life from his time with the centaur Chiron to an episode in which his mother, the sea goddess Thetis, disguises him as a girl on the island of Scyros, where he falls in love with, rapes, and impregnates the princess Deidamia, who gives birth to a son, Pyrrhus. Or, to put it in somewhat different (and far more eloquent) words: "It is about a wild boy brought up in the disappointment of lost immortality, his first experience of human culture, his encounter with the odd puzzle of sex and gender; and it dramatizes the emergence, despite Achilles' confused family circumstances and lack of clear paternal guidance, of his innate virtue and destiny as an epic hero. It is thus a meditation on sons, mothers, foster-fathers and biological fathers, men and animals, men and gods, sex as power, gender as a cultural construction, and gender as innate and essential." (P. J. Heslin, The Transvestite Achilles [Cambridge, 2005], 297) The notes explicate certain syntactical and grammatical aspects that may be challenging for intermediate-advanced students, point out some (not all!) of the various literary/rhetorical figures and tropes that are employed, and supply information on historical, social, cultural, and literary issues raised by Statius' text. In order to encourage reading of the text out loud (an essential component of Latin verse's literary and musical essence, and one that often works hand-in-glove with the literary/rhetorical figures and tropes used, a section of the introduction is devoted to dactylic hexameter, the meter in which Statius' poem - like that of nearly all Latin epics - is written. Also included is John Gower's "Tale of Achilles and Deidamia," a Middle English retelling from the year 1390 of the central episode of Statius' Achilleid. For Gower's verses, glosses of words and idioms whose spelling and/or meaning has changed considerably since his time have been provided to assist the reader in understanding this fascinating offspring of Statius' poem.
Author: David R. Slavitt
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN: 081221630X
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 111
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Book Description
There is more to classical literature than just the classics. Here David Slavitt expands the canon by presenting vivid, graceful, and amusing translations of two neglected fragmentary works of Latin literature. The first is Publius Papinius Statius's first-century epic Achilleid, an extraordinary fusion of epic and New Comedy sentiments and humor that may represent the earliest literary imagining of the charm of adolescence. It relates the story of the education of Achilles under the centaur Chiron, his adopting the disguise of a girl during his sojourn at the court of Lycomedes in Scyros, his love affair with Deidamia, his detection by Ulysses and Diomedes, and his departure for Troy. The second work is Claudius Claudianus's unfinished fourth-century epic version of the rape of Proserpine. The two works together make a delightful pair. The afterword by David Konstan explores the traditions in which—and against which—Statius and Claudian composed their versions of these well-known stories.
Author: William J. Dominik
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004284702
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 722
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Book Description
Brill’s Companion to Statius is the first companion volume to be published on arguably the most important Roman poet of the Flavian period. Thirty-four newly commissioned chapters from international experts provide a comprehensive overview of recent approaches to Statius, discuss the fundamental issues and themes of his poetry, and suggest new fruitful areas for research. All of his works are considered: the Thebaid, his longest extant epic; the Achilleid, his unfinished epic; and the Silvae, his collected short poetry. Particular themes explored include the social, cultural, and political issues surrounding his poetry; his controversial aesthetic; the influence of his predecessors upon his poetry; and the scholarly and literary reception of his poetry in subsequent ages to the present.
Author: Publius Papinius Statius
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674012080
Category : Epic poetry, Latin
Languages : la
Pages : 488
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Book Description
Author: Publius Papinius Statius
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 1421402777
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 434
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Book Description
A classical epic of fratricide and war, the Thebaid retells the legendary conflict between the sons of Oedipus—Polynices and Eteocles—for control of the city of Thebes. The Latin poet Statius reworks a familiar story from Greek myth, dramatized long before by Aeschylus in his tragedy Seven against Thebes. Statius chose his subject well: the Rome of his day, ruled by the emperor Domitian, was not too distant from the civil wars that had threatened the survival of the empire. Published in 92 A.D., the Thebaid was an immediate success, and its fame grew in succeeding centuries. It reached its peak of popularity in the later Middle Ages and Renaissance, influencing Dante, Chaucer, and perhaps Shakespeare. In recent times, however, it has received perhaps less attention than it deserves, in large part because there has been no accessible, dynamic translation of the work into English. Charles Stanley Ross offers a compelling version of the Thebaid rendered into forceful, modern English. Casting Statius's Latin hexameter into a lively iambic pentameter more natural to the modern ear, Ross frees the work from the archaic formality that has marred previous translations. His translation reinvigorates the Thebaid as a whole: its meditative first half and its violent second half; its intimate portrayal of defeat and retribution, and the need to seek justice at any cost. In a wide-ranging introduction, Ross provides an overview of the poem: its composition, reception and legacy; its major themes and literary influences; and its place in Statius' life. And in a helpful series of notes, he offers background information on the major characters and incidents.
Author: Marjorie Curry Woods
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691188742
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 201
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Book Description
Saint Augustine famously “wept for Dido, who killed herself by the sword,” and many later medieval schoolboys were taught to respond in similarly emotional ways to the pain of female characters in Virgil’s Aeneid and other classical texts. In Weeping for Dido, Marjorie Curry Woods takes readers into the medieval classroom, where boys identified with Dido, where teachers turned an unfinished classical poem into a bildungsroman about young Achilles, and where students not only studied but performed classical works. Woods opens the classroom door by examining teachers’ notes and marginal commentary in manuscripts of the Aeneid and two short verse narratives: the Achilleid of Statius and the Ilias latina, a Latin epitome of Homer’s Iliad. She focuses on interlinear glosses—individual words and short phrases written above lines of text that elucidate grammar, syntax, and vocabulary, but that also indicate how students engaged with the feelings and motivations of characters. Interlinear and marginal glosses, which were the foundation of the medieval classroom study of classical literature, reveal that in learning the Aeneid, boys studied and empathized with the feelings of female characters; that the unfinished Achilleid was restructured into a complete narrative showing young Achilles mirroring his mentors, including his mother, Thetis; and that the Ilias latina offered boys a condensed version of the Iliad focusing on the deaths of young men. Manuscript evidence even indicates how specific passages could be performed. The result is a groundbreaking study that provides a surprising new picture of medieval education and writes a new chapter in the reception history of classical literature.
Author: Statius
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 0801458080
Category : Poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 541
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Book Description
The Thebaid, a Latin epic in twelve books by Statius (c. 45–96 C. E.) reexamines events following the abdication of Oedipus, focusing on the civil war between the brothers Eteocles, King of Thebes, and Polynices, who comes at the head of an army from Argos to claim his share of royal power. The poem is long—each of the twelve books comprises over eight hundred lines—and complex, and it exploits a broad range of literary works, both Greek and Latin. Severely curtailed though he was by the emperor Domitian and his Reign of Terror, Statius nevertheless created a meditation on autocratic rule that is still of political interest today. Popular in its own time and much admired in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance—most notably by Dante and Chaucer—the poem fell into obscurity and has, for readers of English, been poorly served by translators. Statius composed his poem in dactylic hexameters, the supreme verse form in antiquity. In his hands, this venerable line is flexible, capable of subtle emphases and dramatic shifts in tempo; it is an expressive, responsive medium. In this new and long-awaited translation the poet Jane Wilson Joyce employs a loose, six-beat line in her English translation, which allows her to reveal something of the original rhythm and of the interplay between sentence structure and verse framework. The clarity of Joyce's translation highlights the poem's superb versification, sophisticated use of intertextuality, and bold formal experimentation and innovation. A substantial introduction and annotations make this epic accessible to students of all levels.
Author: Publius Papinius Statius
Publisher: Liverpool University Press
ISBN: 9781904675112
Category : Poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 161
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Book Description
Statius' Achilleid is perhaps the most remarkable of all Latin epic poems. Its project - to tell the whole life of Achilles - was cut short by the poet's untimely death. Yet the completed first book and the earliest part of the second have a charm and freshness matched only in some of Ovid's most lively and engaging work. The poem tells how the sea-nymph Thetis, in a vain attempt to save her son from his destined end in the Trojan war, hid him on the island of Scyros, disguised as a girl. There he fell in love with the beautiful Deidamia, but at the same time, with the idea of glory in war. His feminine disguise was eventually penetrated by Ulysses and Diomedes, who tricked him into exposure of his truly warlike aspirations. In relating this story Statius explores the nature of gender and the limits of the epic genre, while playfully and wittily positioning himself in the epic - and wider - poetic tradition. These themes are explored in a new introduction by Robert Cowan, which surveys the latest research on the poem. Its assessment, very much in the modern critical manner, contrasts with and complements the traditional textual and philological commentary by O.A.W. Dilke. The combination of these two distinct approaches will assist undergraduates and postgraduates in reading the text, and, at the same time, it will provide a valuable resource for the more advanced scholar.
Author: Johannes Jacobus Louis Smolenaars
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004171347
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 289
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Book Description
The Roman poet P. Papinius Statius (ca. 45-96) is the author of two epics (the "Thebaid" and the unfinished "Achilleid") and a large corpus of occasional verse ("Silvae"). This poetry, long seen as derivative or decadent, is increasingly appreciated for the daring and originality of its responses both to the Greek and Latin literary tradition and to the contemporary Roman world. This volume offers the papers delivered at a symposium on Statius (Amsterdam 2005) by leading scholars in the field from Europe and North America. These papers demonstrate the fascination of Statius' poetry on account of the poet's vast knowledge of Greek and Latin tragedy, his rapid narrative, psychological acumen, brilliant eulogies, and pessimistic views on gods and men. The focus of the collection is on literary technique in the "Thebaid," on socio-historical aspects of the "Silvae," and on the reception of Statius in European literature and scholarship.
