A companion to Greek literature / edited by Martin Hose and David Schenker.

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

A Companion to Greek Literature presents a comprehensive introduction to the wide range of texts and literary forms produced in the Greek language over the course of a millennium beginning from the 6th century BCE up to the early years of the Byzantine Empire.

Features contributions from a wide range of established experts and emerging scholars of Greek literature Offers comprehensive coverage of the many genres and literary forms produced by the ancient Greeks--including epic and lyric poetry, oratory, historiography, biography, philosophy, the novel, and technical literature Includes readings that address the production and transmission of ancient Greek texts, historic reception, individual authors, and much more Explores the subject of ancient Greek literature in innovative ways

Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

This recent addition to the "Blackwell Companions to the Ancient World" series offers a conservative introduction to the study of classical Greek literature. The volume reviews traditional foci of classical scholarship (texts and transmission, orality and literacy, periods and genres) but for the most part eschews new debates. Hose (Ludwig Maximilian Univ. of Munich, Germany) and Schenker (Univ. of Missouri) provide an introduction and follow that with 33 essays organized into eight parts. The essays in part 1, on the mechanics and means of literary production in antiquity and extant texts and their transmission, contextualize the contents of the rest of the volume. The remaining seven parts treat the periods of Greek literature, from oral epic to Christian writings; genres, from epic to technical literature; the players and places that animate classical Greek literature; the relationship between literature and knowledge and between literature and aesthetics; and reception. Though the volume successfully sums up the status quaetionis of many Greek genres and contemporary scholarship, in some ways it underplays the excitement and achievement of classical Greek literature by playing it safe. Summing Up: Optional. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty. --Alison M. Keith, University of Toronto