The Swineherd and the Bow: Representations of Class in the OdysseyCornell University Press, 1998 - 330 sider The Odyssey, William G. Thalmann asserts, does not describe an actual historical society at any period, but gives a selective, idiosyncratic, and contradictory picture to serve ideological ends, representing rather than reproducing social reality. The Swineherd and the Bow is an ambitious attempt to apply literary and social science theory in order to reveal Homeric epic as a form of class discourse within the context of early Greek social and political development.Drawing upon recent scholarship in archaeology and cultural anthropology, Thalmann considers the evolution of Greek culture up to the formation of the polis in the late eighth century B.C. He demonstrates that Greek society was already stratified well before that date and that the distinction between an elite and other classes was well developed. Thalmann concentrates on the representation of slaves and on the dynamics of competition and family structure in the contest of the bow to interpret the Odyssey and, implicitly, epic poetry generally as an intervention in the conflicts that surrounded the birth of the polis. In the interests of the aristocracy, the poem appropriates a traditional cultural paradigm, enshrined in the story of the Hero's return. The distortions of dark age reality, he maintains, should form the basis of an historicizing reading of the poem." |
Innhold
Introduction | 1 |
in the Odyssey | 49 |
The Contest of the | 109 |
Appropriating Paradigms | 239 |
Bibliography | 272 |
321 | |
Vanlige uttrykk og setninger
Agamemnon Akhaians Akhilleus Antinoos aristocratic Aristotle Athena audience basileus beggar Book 21 Chapter compete competition conflict contest culture depicted discussion disguise distinction dmões dmōiai Dolios dominant Donlan elite episode especially Eumaios and Philoitios Eumaios's Eurykleia Eurymakhos Eurynome example fact father Finley gender gift give Greek Gschnitzer guest Helen Herakles heroes heroic Hesiod hierarchical Homeric Homeric epics honor household husband ideological Iliad implies interests Iros Ithaka killing kinship Laertes Laodamas male marriage master means Melanthios Menelaos Nagler Nagy narrative nature Odysseus Odysseus's oikos Oinomaos paradigm passage Peisistratos Pelops Penelope Penelope's Phaiakian Pitt-Rivers poem poem's polis political position relations representation role Sarakatsani says scene seems sense sexual shows significant slavery slaves social society status story string the bow structure suggest suitors Telemakhos Telemakhos's tion Trojan Trojan War Tydeus violence woman women word δὲ καὶ τε