The Play of Texts and Fragments

The Play of Texts and Fragments

Author: J. Robert C. Cousland

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2009

Total Pages: 595

ISBN-13: 9004174737

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This volume is arguably one of the most important studies of Euripides to appear in the last decade. Not only does it offer incisive examinations of many of Euripides' extant plays and their influence, it also includes seminal examinations of a number of Euripides fragmentary plays. This approach represents a novel and exciting development in Euripidean studies, since it is only very recently that the fragmentary plays have begun to appear in reliable and readily accessible editions. The book s thirty-two contributors constitute an international "who s who" of Euripidean studies and Athenian drama, and their contributions will certainly feature in the forefront of scholarly discourse on Euripides and Greek drama for years to come.


Sophron's Mimes

Sophron's Mimes

Author: Sophron

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 224

ISBN-13:

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J. H. Hordern provides a text (based on Kassel and Austin's Poetae Comici Graeci text but with significant additions), translation, and detailed commentary on the surviving fragments of Sophron's mimes. The commentary deals with both literary and linguistic questions, but focuses particularly on Sophron's relationship with earlier traditions (for example, iambus) and his influence on later literature (for example, the work of Theocritus). A substantial introduction furnishes an overview of the biographical evidence, and discusses the vexed question of audience and performance, arguing that the mimes were essentially symposiac entertainment rather than stage performances. There is detailed discussion of Sophron's dialect and lexicon, the textual tradition, and his impact on post-classical literature.


Decimus Laberius

Decimus Laberius

Author: Costas Panayotakis

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2010-02-11

Total Pages: 543

ISBN-13: 1139485458

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This is a newly revised, critical text of the fragments attributed to the Roman knight and mimographer Decimus Laberius, a witty and crudely satirical contemporary of Cicero and Caesar. Laberius is perhaps the most celebrated comic playwright of the late Republic, and the fragments of plays attributed to him comprise the overwhelming majority of the extant evidence for what we conventionally call 'the literary Roman mime'. The volume also includes a survey of the characteristics and development of the Roman mime, both as a literary genre and as a type of popular theatrical entertainment, as well as a re-evaluation of the place of Laberius' work within its historical and literary context. This is the first English translation of all the fragments, and the first detailed English commentary on them from a linguistic, metrical, and (wherever possible) theatrical perspective.


An Introduction

An Introduction

Author: Giulio Colesanti

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG

Published: 2014-08-27

Total Pages: 212

ISBN-13: 3110390205

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This volume deals with the submerged literature of ancient Greece; that is, all the texts produced for socially relevant events that have contributed to the configuration and articulation of ancient Greek culture as we know it. In particular, the hermeneutic tool of submerged literature may shed new light on the dynamics behind the 'emersion' or 'submersion' of certain texts during different periods. The category of submerged literature is extended here to include preserved and lost texts as well as those texts that can be reconstructed through investigation. The volume investigates the manifold speech acts that we know of through various sources and that, either from the outset or over the course of time, have been placed at the edge of diffusion, conservation and transmission. The essays contained in the volume deal with questions of hermeneutics, philology and methodology, as well as with epic cycles, lyric poetry, tragedy, comedy, satyr drama, and mime. By approaching these genres from the perspective of submerged literature, the book tries to provide a more precise contextualization of the texts within the communication system of ancient Greece. The book thus presents a new line of research and a series of studies that take a fresh look at the texts and all archaeological and iconographic sources relating to Greek culture, taking into account the results of ethnographic and anthropological research. This extensive investigation examines unique ancient Greek orality and literacy dynamics using a new hermeneutic frame that will hopefully reshape our understanding of ancient Greek culture.


Roman Republican Theatre

Roman Republican Theatre

Author: Gesine Manuwald

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2011-06-09

Total Pages: 403

ISBN-13: 1139499742

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Theatre flourished in the Roman Republic, from the tragedies of Ennius and Pacuvius to the comedies of Plautus and Terence and the mimes of Laberius. Yet apart from the surviving plays of Plautus and Terence the sources are fragmentary and difficult to interpret and contextualise. This book provides a comprehensive history of all aspects of the topic, incorporating recent findings and modern approaches. It discusses the origins of Roman drama and the historical, social and institutional backgrounds of all the dramatic genres to be found during the Republic (tragedy, praetexta, comedy, togata, Atellana, mime and pantomime). Possible general characteristics are identified, and attention is paid to the nature of and developments in the various genres. The clear structure and full bibliography also ensure that the book has value as a source of reference for all upper-level students and scholars of Latin literature and ancient drama.