DOCSLIB.ORG

The Greek Alexander Romance Free Ebook

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
The Greek Alexander Romance Free Ebook FREETHE GREEK ALEXANDER ROMANCE EBOOK Richard Stoneman | 208 pages | 05 Nov 1991 | Penguin Books Ltd | 9780140445602 | English | London, United Kingdom Alexander Romance - Wikipedia Alexander romanceany of a body of legends about the career of Alexander the Greattold and retold with varying emphasis and purpose by succeeding ages and civilizations. The chief source of all Alexander romance literature was a folk epic written in Greek by a Hellenized Egyptian in Alexandria during the 2nd century ad. Surviving translations and copies make its reconstruction possible. It portrayed Alexander as a national messianic herothe natural son of an Egyptian wizard-king by the wife of Philip II of Macedon. In later romances, however, marvels and exotic anecdotes predominated and gradually eclipsed the historical personality. This work inspired the Alexanderlied by the German poet Lamprecht der Pfaffe. An The Greek Alexander Romance poet, Thomas of Kent, wrote the Roman de toute chevalerie toward the end of the 12th century, and about this was remodeled to become the Middle English romance of King Alisaunder. Italian Alexander romances began to appear during the 14th century, closely followed by versions in Swedish, Danish, Scots, and dating from a little earlier in the Slavic languages. The Arabs, expanding Syrian versions of the legend, passed them on to the many peoples with whom they came in contact. Alexander romance literature declined in the late 12th century, and, with the revival of classical scholarship during the Renaissance, historical accounts displaced the Alexander romances. Alexander romance Article Additional Info. Print Cite. Facebook Twitter. Give Feedback The Greek Alexander Romance Websites. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article requires login. External Websites. The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by The Greek Alexander Romance on that content or via study for an advanced degree See Article History. Get exclusive access to content from our First Edition with your subscription. Subscribe today. Learn More in these related The Greek Alexander Romance articles:. The central theme is the exploits of Alexander the Great, The Greek Alexander Romance the narrative includes fanciful accounts of his adventures in foreign lands and of the…. Erotic elegy The Greek Alexander Romance epigram may have contributed something and so may the lost Milesian Tales of Aristides of Miletus…. It introduces fantastic elements, more especially technological wonders and the marvels of India: the springs of rejuvenation, the flower-maidens growing in a forest, the…. History at your fingertips. Sign up here to see what happened On This Dayevery day in your inbox! Email address. By signing up, you agree to our Privacy Notice. The Greek Alexander Romance on the lookout for your Britannica newsletter to get trusted stories delivered right to your inbox. Alexander romance | literature | Britannica Uh-oh, it looks like your Internet Explorer is out of date. For a better shopping experience, please upgrade now. Javascript is not enabled in your browser. Enabling JavaScript in your browser will allow you to experience all the features of our site. Learn how to enable JavaScript on your browser. NOOK Book. Home 1 Books 2. Read an excerpt of this book! Add to Wishlist. Sign in to Purchase Instantly. Members save with free shipping everyday! See details. The Greek Alexander Romance Since his death in the third century BC, each age has woven its own legends around the figure of Alexander the Great. If the Hebrew tradition saw him as a preacher and prophet, to the Persians he was alternately a true king and an arch-Satan, while in modern Greece he is revered more as a wise man than as a conqueror. One of the most influential works of late classical Greek literature, it reached Europe in the Middle Ages, and its effects are still visible to us in illuminated manuscripts and cathedral sculptures portraying Alexander's fabulous adventures - his taming of the horse Bucephalus, the The Greek Alexander Romance with Amazons and Brahmins, the quest for the Water of Life, the ascent to heaven in a basket borne by eagles. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the The Greek Alexander Romance world. Product Details Table of Contents. Related Searches. The Age of Alexander. Plutarch's influential writings on the ancient worldPlutarch's parallel biographies of the great men in Greek Plutarch's influential writings on the ancient The Greek Alexander Romance parallel biographies of the great men in Greek and Roman history are cornerstones of European literature, drawn on by countless writers since the Renaissance. This selection provides intimate glimpses into the lives of View Product. Buddhist Scriptures. While Buddhism has no central text comparable to the Bible or Koran, there is The Greek Alexander Romance While Buddhism has no central text comparable to the Bible or Koran, there is a powerful body of scripture from across Asia that encompasses the dharma, or the teachings of the Buddha. In this rich anthology, eminent scholar Donald S. The Death of King Arthur. Recounting the final days of Arthur, this thirteenth-century French version of the Camelot legend, written Recounting the final days of Arthur, this thirteenth-century French version of the Camelot legend, written by an unknown author, is set The Greek Alexander Romance a world of fading chivalric glory. It depicts the Round Table diminished in strength after the Quest for Healers on Healing. In thirty-seven original essays written for this book, some of the world's leaders in healing In thirty-seven original essays written for this book, some of the world's leaders in healing explore their personal and professional experiences in order to uncover the underlying principles on which all healing rests. Rather than focusing on diverse techniques, the In Bed with a Spy. When her husband is killed at Waterloo, Lilias Fairchild takes up his cavalry sword and The Martyred. Written in a The Greek Alexander Romance of total austerity; and yet the passion of the book is Written in a mood of total austerity; and yet the passion of the book is perpetually beating up against its seemingly barren surface. I am deeply moved. Myths of the Ancient Greeks. Once a Ranger. Spur Award winner Dusty Richards is back with a brand-new adventure featuring a former Texas Penguin Publishing Group. Penguin Classics Series. Alexander Romance - Oxford Classical Dictionary The Alexander Romance is an account of the life and exploits of Alexander the Great. Although constructed around a historical The Greek Alexander Romance, the romance is largely fictional. It was widely copied and translated, accruing legends and fantastical elements at different stages. The original version was composed in the Greek language before AD, The Greek Alexander Romance a Latin translation was made. Several late manuscripts attribute the work to Alexander's court The Greek Alexander Romance Callisthenesbut the The Greek Alexander Romance person died before Alexander and could not have written a full account of The Greek Alexander Romance life. The unknown author is still sometimes known as Pseudo-Callisthenes. The romance was also put into verseas in a Byzantine recension of Owing to the great variety of distinct works derived from the original Greek romance, the "Alexander romance" is sometimes treated as a literary genre and not a single work. Alexander was a legend during his own time. In a now-lost history of the king, the historical Callisthenes described the sea in Cilicia as drawing back from him in proskynesis. Writing after Alexander's death, another participant, Onesicritusinvented a tryst between Alexander and Thalestrisqueen of the mythical Amazons. According to Plutarchwhen Onesicritus read this passage to his patron Lysimachusone of Alexander's generals who later became a king himself, Lysimachus quipped "I wonder where I was at the time. Throughout Antiquity and the Middle Agesthe Romance experienced numerous expansions and revisions exhibiting a variability unknown for more formal literary forms. A 10th-century Latin version by one Leo the Archpriest is the basis of the later The Greek Alexander Romance vernacular translations in all the major languages of Europeincluding Old French 12th centuryThe Greek Alexander Romance EnglishEarly Scots The Buik of Alexander 13th centuryItalianSpanish The Greek Alexander Romance Libro de AlexandreCentral German Lamprecht 's Alexanderlied and a 15th-century version by Johannes HartliebSlavonic[ citation needed ] Romanian[ citation needed ] Hungarian and Irish. In addition to the Alexander Romance of Pseudo-Callisthenes, the Syriac version also includes a short appendix now known as the Syriac Alexander Legend. It was subjected to various revisions during the Byzantine Empiresome of them recasting The Greek Alexander Romance into poetical form in Medieval Greek vernacular. Most of the content of the Romance is fantastical, including many miraculous tales and encounters with mythical creatures such as Sirens or Centaurs. In medieval England the Alexander Romance experienced a remarkable popularity. It is even referred to in Chaucer 's Canterbury Taleswhere the monk apologizes to the The Greek Alexander Romance group for treating a material so well known. There are five major romances in Middle English which have been passed down to us and most remain only in fragments. There are also two versions from Scotlandone which has sometimes been ascribed to the Early Scots poet John Barbour which exists only in The Greek Alexander Romance sixteenth-century printing, and a Middle Scots version from Josephus in his Antiquities of the Jews mentions that Alexander visited Jerusalem and saluted the high priest, saying that he had seen him in his dreams back in Macedonia. The Talmud also has many legends relating to Alexander, For example, it mentions that the Samaritans conspired for the destruction of the temple, but Alexander prostrated himself at the feet of the high priest Simon the Just.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Introduction
    Introduction KONSTANTIN DOULAMIS University College Cork This collection of articles originated in the colloquium ‘The Ancient Novel and its Reception of Earlier Literature’, which was held at University Col- lege Cork in August 2007, with funding from UCC’s Faculty of Arts and the Classics Department. As the conference theme indicates, the purpose of that two-day event was to explore the reception of antecedent literature in Greek and Roman narratives, to consider ways in which earlier texts are assimilated in prose fiction, and to reflect on the implications that this assimilation may have for our understanding of the works discussed. The colloquium, which comprised papers on a variety of texts, from the ‘canonical’ Greek romances and the Roman novels to Alexander’s Letter about India and the Alexander Romance, gave birth to stimulating discussions, both in and out of confe- rence sessions, in a relaxed yet productive ambience of fruitful academic exchange, constructive criticism and collegiality, and yielded some interest- ing conclusions. The following are some of the main questions that were raised and de- bated during the colloquium: Is the ancient novel distinctive in its reception of earlier literary production? To what extent can we talk of a ‘sociology of reception’? Can intertextuality in the Greek and Roman narratives be used in order to define a specific type of reader or social model? What role does the author of a text play in all this? Should emphasis be placed on authorial in- tent or on textual relations? The revised version of the nine conference pa- pers collected here explore these and other similar broad questions, focusing on various types of literary echoes in ancient narratives.
    [Show full text]
  • The Apprentice's Sorcerer: Pancrates and His Pow Ers
    ACTA CLASSICA XLVII (2004) 101-126 ISSN 0065-1141 THE APPRENTICE’S SORCERER: PANCRATES AND HIS POW ERS IN CONTEXT (LUCIAN, PHILOPSEUDES 33-36)∗ Daniel Ogden University of Exeter ABSTRACT The figure of the sorcerer Pancrates in Lucian’s tale of The Sorcerer’s Apprentice at Philopseudes 33-36 alludes to the traditions relating to Hadrian’s poet Pancrates Epicus and to those relating to his supposed magicial guru Pachrates. These traditions are argued to have had a common origin, and new arguments are advanced for this position. Lucian further exploits the significance of Pancrates’ name (‘All-powerful’) in relation to that of a well-established character-type within his stock-in-trade, Eucrates (‘Well- powerful’), who is accordingly cast in the role of his apprentice. Pancrates’ focal spell, the animation of the pestle for domestic service, reflects the themes and concerns of contempary magical practice as documented in the papyri. Admonitory Cynic imagery, of a sort found elsewhere in the Philopseudes, may be latent both in the figure of Pancates and in his pestle. The famous tale of The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, now known principally from the works of Goethe and Disney,1 originates among the ‘lying’ stories related in Lucian’s dialogue Philopseudes or Lover of Lies.2 Here Tychiades gives his friend ∗ I acknowledge with gratitude the significant contributions made to the development of this paper by: the staff of the department of Classics, Near and Far Eastern and Religious Studies at UNISA; the staff of the Classics Department in the University of Natal at Pietermaritzburg, where an incunabular version was delivered in 2001; and the anonymous AClass referees.
    [Show full text]
  • THE ETHIOPIC ALEXANDER ROMANCE Peter Christos Kotar Introduction the Ethiopic Alexander Romance Is Written in the Old Ethiopic L
    CHAPTER SEVEN THE ETHIOPIC ALEXANDER ROMANCE Peter Christos Kotar Introduction The Ethiopic Alexander romance is written in the old Ethiopic language Ge’ez, a Semitic language, belonging to the south-Semitic branch.1 Ge’ez has been used in literature from the 4th century on in the north- ern part of Ethiopia (Eritrea). Center of the Ethiopic culture after 100 A.D. was the city of Aksum. Shortly after 340, the kingdom of Aksum was Christianized.2 In the 13th century, beginning with the so-called “Salomonian dynasty” (1270–1285), founded by Jekuno Amlak, a new orientation of Ethiopic literature took place with a strong dependence on the Christian-Arabic literature of the Coptic church of Egypt.3 In this golden era of Ethiopic literature, at the end of the 14th century, falls the Zēnā Eskender [history of Alexander the Great], a genuine creation of Ethiopic literature, not to be confused with the Alexan- der romance of Pseudo-Callisthenes (PC).4 Later, both the 16th and 17th centuries were further high points of Ethiopic literature. Dur- ing this period, the monastery of Dabra Libanos was the most impor- tant center of Arabo-Ethiopic translation.5 It can be assumed that the 1 J. Tropper, Altäthiopisch. Grammatik des Ge’ez mit Übungstext und Glossar. pp. 1–3; F. Prätorius, Äthiopische Grammatik mit Paradigmen, Litteratur, Chrestoma- thie und Glossar. pp. 3–4; T.O. Lambdin, Introduction to Classical Ethiopic (Ge’ez); S. Procházka, Altäthiopische Studiengrammatik. Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis. Subsidia linguistica 2; O. Raineri, Introduzione alla lingua Ge’ez. 2 Ge’ez as language of the clergy is still used in the Ethiopic church as language of the scripts and liturgy.
    [Show full text]
  • Alexander's Return to Greece in the Alexander Romance
    Alexander’s Return to Greece in the Alexander Romance Benjamin Garstad HE ALEXANDER ROMANCE, a largely fictional account of Alexander the Great, is full of odd and arresting T discrepancies with the more trustworthy historical accounts of the conqueror’s career. The route of the campaign described in the Romance is not the least of these inconsistencies, taking Alexander, as it does, along roads he never traveled and to places he never saw. Perhaps the oddest and most remark- able deviation from the historical record in the Romance’s version of Alexander’s itinerary is not a visit to some unlikely, exotic, or fabulous locale, but his return to Greece in the midst of his eastern campaign. Whereas, in fact, Alexander crossed the Hellespont never to see Macedonia or Greece again, in the Romance he comes back to put down an uprising of the Greeks and lay waste Thebes before he finally defeats Darius and completes the conquest of the Persian Empire. As Stoneman notes, the narrative here is “[l]ike a film running in reverse,”1 and the effect can be just as comical and disconcerting. Even the Romance’s idiosyncratic deviation has its own dis- crepancies, since the Romance survives in several identifiable versions, or recensions, each marked by its distinctive ad- ditions, omissions, and elaborations. The differences occur already in the two earliest verions: the α recension, represented by a single Greek manuscript, Parisinus graecus 1711 (A), Julius Valerius’ Latin translation (ca. 270–330), and the Armenian translation (ca. 500), and the later β recension, written after 1 Richard Stoneman, The Greek Alexander Romance (London 1991) 191 n.44.
    [Show full text]
  • The Creative Reception of the Alexander Romance in Iran
    The Creative Reception of the Alexander Romance in Iran Ulrich Marzolph hen the Greek emperor Alexander died, aged 33, in the year 323 BCE, his life and career destined him to become the ideal model W for the topos of valiant hero and reckless conqueror. Considering his conquest of more or less the whole world known to the Greek culture of his day, he would even become the quintessential expression of a world ruler. In world literature, no other historical character plays a similarly significant role. No other character has been portrayed so often and in so many different ways in historical literature, in epics, romances, and legends, in songs and dramatic poetry, in works of pious edification and in prophetic revelations.1 In terms of geography, the narrative tradition dealing with Alexander covers primarily the whole of Europe and the Near and Middle East. In terms of chronology, it has stayed alive and vibrant, albeit with changing notions, from the earliest versions up to the very present. As a matter of fact, the Alexander tradition is so overwhelmingly present in both space and time that in a historical perspective it is hard to think of any work of transnational narrative literature surpassing its popularity. Consequently, it was neither surprising nor coincidental that Alexander became the focus of scholarly attention towards the end of the second millennium CE, when his memory was celebrated in various conferences, large research projects, and numerous scholarly publications.2 The narrative tradition focusing on Alexander derives mostly from a work of late Greek antiquity that has erroneously been attributed to Greek historian Callisthenes (ca.
    [Show full text]
  • “Alexander the Great: a Lesson Taught by Roman Historians” Jaxon Saunders Western Oregon University, [email protected]
    Western Oregon University Digital Commons@WOU Student Theses, Papers and Projects (History) Department of History 2011 “Alexander the Great: A Lesson Taught by Roman Historians” Jaxon Saunders Western Oregon University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.wou.edu/his Part of the European History Commons Recommended Citation Saunders, Jaxon, "“Alexander the Great: A Lesson Taught by Roman Historians”" (2011). Student Theses, Papers and Projects (History). 100. https://digitalcommons.wou.edu/his/100 This Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of History at Digital Commons@WOU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Student Theses, Papers and Projects (History) by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons@WOU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Jaxon Saunders History 499 Senior Thesis June 13, 2011 © Jaxon Saunders, 2011 Alexander the Great: A Lesson Taught by Roman Historians ΣΤΟΝ ΚΑΛΛΙΤΕΡΟ ΠΑΝΕ ΤΑ ΛΑΦΥΡΑ ΤΗΣ ΓΝΩΣΗΣ (to the best goes the spoils of knowledge) Saunders 1 The image of Alexander the Great, “according to the many legends he was a king, a hero, a god, a conqueror, a philosopher, a scientist, a prophet, a statesman, and a visionary.”1 This is the story of Alexander the Great that is taught. The deeds of valor are truly awe-inspiring to those who take them at face value. Alexander is seen as a man who broke the mold. Libraries have been devoted to the study of Alexander. However, over the past sixty years scholars have become divided about their understanding of such a figure.
    [Show full text]
  • Persuasion, Emotion, and the Letters of the Alexander Romance
    Persuasion, Emotion, and the Letters of the Alexander Romance JACQUELINE ARTHUR-MONTAGNE Stanford University Mixture is the letter, the epistle which is not a genre, but all genres, literature itself. Jacques Derrida, The Postcard (48) The presence of over thirty letters embedded in the Greek Alexander Romance has garnered frequent attention from scholars of epistolography, novels, and fiction.1 These letters are widely distributed throughout the three books of the Romance, attributed to various characters in the plot. What is most striking about the deployment of letters in the narrative is the mixture of different epis- tolographical types. From battle briefs, boastful barbarian epistles, and lengthy letters of marvels, it is clear that the epistolary frame here operates in very different capacities. I know of no other work of ancient fiction that in- corporates so many different epistolary forms. If it is fair to regard epistolog- raphy as a spectrum of genres,2 then the Alexander Romance spans the full register from functional to philosophical. Sorting the sources and interrelationships of these letters has been a chal- lenge for critics, further complicated by the tangled transmission history and the multiple recensions of the Alexander Romance. Reinhold Merkelbach’s seminal study in 1954 made a crucial and intuitive distinction between the lengthy ‘Wunderbriefe’ and the novel’s shorter letters: he claimed that the lat- ter category represents the remnants of a lost epistolary novel about the life of ————— 1 Hägg 1983, 126 regards the incorporation of letters as the ‘most important innovation’ on the part of the author. For the most recent treatments, see Konstan 1998, Rosenmeyer 2001 (ch.
    [Show full text]
  • Lucian‟ S Paradoxa: Fiction, Aesthetics, and Identity
    i Lucian‟s Paradoxa: Fiction, Aesthetics, and Identity A dissertation submitted to the Graduate School of the University of Cincinnati in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Classics of the College of Arts and Sciences by Valentina Popescu BA University of Iasi June 2009 Committee Chair: Kathryn J. Gutzwiller, Professor of Classics Abstract This dissertation represents a novel approach to the Lucianic corpus and studies paradox, with rhetorical, philosophical, and aesthetic implications, as Lucian‟s distinctive discursive mode of constructing cultural identity and literary innovation. While criticizing paradoxography - the literature of wonders - as true discourse, Lucian creates a novel, avowed false, discourse, as a form of contemplation and regeneration of the Greek literary tradition. Paradoxography is Lucian‟s favorite self-referential discourse in prolaliai, rhetorical introductions, where he strives to earn doxa through paradoxa - paradigms of exoticism applied to both author and work. Lucian elevates paradox from exotic to aesthetic, from hybrid novelty to astonishing beauty, expecting his audience to sublimate the experience of ekplexis from bewilderment to aesthetic pleasure. Lucian‟s construction of cultural identity, as an issue of tension between Greek and barbarian and between birthright and paideutic conquest, is predicated on paradoxology, a first- personal discourse based on rhetorical and philosophical paradox. While the biography of the author insinuates itself into the biography of the speaker, Lucian creates tension between macro- text and micro-text. Thus, the text becomes also its opposite and its reading represents almost an aporetic experience. iii iv To my family for their love, sacrifices, and prayers and to the memory of Ion Popescu, Doina Tatiana Mănoiu, and Nicolae Catrina v Table of Contents Introduction 1 1.
    [Show full text]
  • A Companion to Alexander Literature in the Middle Ages
    Brill’s Companions to the Christian Tradition A series of handbooks and reference works on the intellectual and religious life of Europe, 500–1800 Editor-in-Chief Christopher M. Bellitto (Kean University) VOLUME 29 The titles published in this series are listed at brill.nl/bcct A Companion to Alexander Literature in the Middle Ages Edited by Z. David Zuwiyya LEIDEN • BOSTON 2011 Cover illustration: The cover illustration shows the image of Alexander the Great feeding the griffins during his celestial flight. It is from the mosaic on the floor of the Otranto Cathedral in Puglia, Italy made in 1163–1165. Credit for the image goes to Roberta Morosini of Wake Forest University. This book is printed on acid-free paper. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A companion to Alexander literature in the Middle Ages / edited by Z. David Zuwiyya. p. cm. — (Brill’s companions to the Christian tradition, ISSN 1871–6377 ; v. 29) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-90-04-18345-2 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Literature, Medieval—History and criticism. 2. Romances—History and criticism. 3. Alexander, the Great, 356–323 B.C—In literature. 4. Alexander, the Great, 356–323 B.C.—Influence. I. Zuwiyya, Z. David (Zachary David), 1964– PN682.A48C66 2011 809’.93351—dc22 2011012272 ISSN 1871-6377 ISBN 978 90 04 18345 2 Copyright 2011 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Global Oriental, Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher.
    [Show full text]
  • An Early Source of the Alexander Romance Beverly Berg
    An Early Source of the "Alexander Romance" Berg, Beverly Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies; Winter 1973; 14, 4; ProQuest pg. 381 An Early Source of the Alexander Romance Beverly Berg UCH of the fanciful material from the Hellenistic period on MAlexander the Great was gathered together in the Alexander Romance, a conglomerate work made up of disparate sources.1 The Romance enjoyed great popularity throughout the Middle Ages. Its wide circulation proved to be its textual undoing, for it was handled and mishandled so often before it reached the eleventh cen­ tury (the date of A, the earliest of numerous and variegated MSS) that the original wording and, in some cases, contents can only be approxi­ mated. Yet most of the internal contradictions and chronological confusion found in the Romance cannot be blamed on the mediaeval scribes but stem from the original nature of the work. It was never a simple, uniform book but a jumble of once separate works on Alexan­ der, all of a popular, imaginative nature, awkwardly pieced together 1 The Latin translation by Julius Valerius of the Romance, edited by B. KUbler, Res Gestae Alexandri Macedonis (Leipzig 1888), the fifth-century Armenian version, and a Greek MS, A, constitute the earliest manuscript group, a. The Armenian version has been retranslated into Greek by R. Raabe, Historia Alexandrou (Leipzig 1898). W. Kroll in his edition of A, Historia Alexandri Magni (Berlin 1926), tries to give an approximation of the a prototype. 0, an offshoot of a, is the lost Greek text used by the archpriest Leo for his popular tenth­ century Latin translation: see Pfister's edition, Der Alexanderroman des Archipresbyters Leo (Heidelberg 1913).
    [Show full text]
  • The Alexander Romance
    Source: B.P. Reardon, Collected Ancient Greek Novels (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989). PSEUDO-CALLISTHENES THE ALEXANDER ROMANCE TRANSLATED BY KEN DOWDEN Introduction The Alexander Romance, as it is usually called, was antiquity’s most suc­ cessful novel. Its author is unknown, its date uncertain, its literary qual­ ity doubtful; but eighty versions in twenty-four languages testify to a popularity and diffusion exceeded only by the Bible. The author was more a compiler than a creative artist. A Greek- speaker living in Alexandria at some time between A .D . 140 and 340, he seems to have used mainly two books, merging them to form the Life and Deeds of Alexander of Macedon, which is often falsely ascribed in our manuscripts to Kallisthenes, Alexander’s court historian. The first of the two books was a varied collection of fictions concerning Alexander. It included a sort of epistolary novel of about 100 B .C ., which consisted chiefly of the correspondence of Alexander with his adversaries, notably Darius and Poros, and revealed the character of the correspondents, as ancient epistolary fictions were meant to do (examples start at 1.36). In this book was also a different sort o f letter, in which Alexander sent back a description o f marvels and monsters at the fringes o f the world to his mother, Olympias (2.23-41), and to his tutor Aristotle (3.17, though our particular version no longer presents it as a letter). Other pieces in this collection may have included Alexander’s interview with the “naked philosophers” of India (3.5-6); the romantic novelette of Alexander and Kandake, queen of Ethiopia (3.18-23—destined to become even more romantic and “ courtly” in the Middle Ages); and a pamphlet— maybe even a piece of contemporary propaganda—on how Alexander died, in­ cluding his last will and testament.
    [Show full text]
  • A] Ancient Greek and Roman Literature NA Ch. 1, + Pp.18-32 What Is the Novel, Nove
    Humanities-Classics 250 Donald Lateiner TTH @ 10:00, Spring 2007 THE ANCIENT NOVEL ST 109; off. ST 216 My e-mail: dglatein My phone: 3575 BOOKS: Purchase the following lively ancient fictions and 1 critical survey at the bookstore: 1. Menander, The Plays and Fragments, tr. Balme, Oxford 2. Petronius, Satyrica, Penguin, tr. Branham, U. Cal. 3. Apuleius, The Golden Ass, tr. Walsh Oxford, 4. Reardon, B.P. ed. The Collected Ancient Greek Novels, U.Cal. = CAGN 5. Hägg, Th. The Novel in Antiquity, U.Cal. 1983= NA. Lavishly illustrated Some xeroxed materials necessary from the beginning will be available for purchase. WEEK TOPIC READINGS l. Introductory (Elite & Popular Culture) a] Ancient Greek and Roman literature NA ch. 1, + pp.18-32 What is the novel, novella, romance, etc.? (useful summary) b] The Greek “ideal” novel: Xenophon of Ephesus Love, travel, sexual frustration, violence CAGN 125-69 Paradigm, epitome, or worst case of the genre? 2. Paradigmatic Antecedents I: a] Epic: Homer: Folktale and Fiction Ody. 10, 19 (xeroc.) Sex, Marriage, Witchcraft NA pp. 109-17 b] : Historiography: Herodotus Hist. Selects. xeroc. Power, conflict, sexual bargains [slides] 3. Antecedents II a] Stage & Drama: Menander’s Comedy The Grouch Bourgeois bargains b] People pawns The Samian Woman [Also Euripides’ Tragedies (e.g., Alcestis) & Aristotle] 4. Antecedents III a] Pastoral poetry: Theocritus: fantastic & sordid love NA 121-24; Idylls (xeroc.) b] Outlines: Parthenius: Erotic Agonies quiz?? Selected Pathemata c]Hellenistic Epic: Ovid: Metamorphosis = Pseudo-Salvations Metam. xi, Ceyx & Alcyone 5. Roman “realististic” novel, Imperial I (Neronian) Introd. xi-xxxvi; a] Petronius: Satire & Picaresque literature Satyricon, pp.
    [Show full text]