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Introduction to Ancient Literature: Greece

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Introduction to Ancient Literature: Greece Introduction to Ancient Literature: Greece Instructor: Barbara Clayton email: TBA Texts: The Norton Book of Classical Literature, Bernard Knox, ed. (required) Classical Literature, An Introduction, Neil Croally and Roy Hyde (recommended) Grading: No Grade Requested: This is the default. C/NC: You must provide evidence that you have attended class (to the best of your ability) and read the assigned material. My suggestion is that you submit a brief reader’s response a/o question or two on a weekly basis, either via email or handed to me in class. Choose a passage that resonates with you—one that you find particularly beautiful, or intriguing, or perplexing—and tell me why. All students are encouraged to do this, whether or not you are taking the course for credit. Letter Grade: A 5-6 page paper on a topic of your choosing. Ideally, you would select an author or a work represented in our anthology and expand your acquaintance with him/her. A traditional interpretive essay is one that explores themes, imagery, a comparison of two author’s treatment of the same topic, etc. However if you have something else in mind, I am open to any and all ideas; it just needs to be a project that can be evaluated and given a grade. Objectives: Our goal in this course is to get a sense of the different genres that constitute Greek literature, and to understand them in their historical context. Genres in Greek literature are, for the most part, associated with a specific historical time period. (All dates are BCE.) Epic and lyric poetry dominate the Archaic period; the 5th century is known for drama and history; in the 4th century prose takes center stage in the form of philosophy and rhetoric. The last historical period, the Hellenistic era, puts its own spin on numerous genres (and adds a new one, bucolic poetry), reflecting the significant cultural changes in the Greek world of this time. At the same time, we will focus on close reading skills. Thanks to the skillful editing of Bernard Knox, our anthology presents us with excerpts that represent some of the most interesting and beautifully crafted texts in all of Greek literature. To use a convoluted culinary analogy, we will be experiencing a literary smorgasbord, but one that consists mainly of appetizers, designed to whet the appetite for more! Schedule: Week 1: Introduction: Historical overview from the late Bronze Age to the Hellenistic period; background for reading the selections from the Homeric epics. Please read: Bernard Knox’s “Introduction” in the Norton Book of Classical Literature [henceforth NBCL] pp. 22-44. Week 2: Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey Selections from the Iliad: from Books 6, 21, and 24 (NBCL pp. 63-68; 84-112) Selections from the Odyssey: Proem and Book 9 (NBCL pp. 112; 127-143) Optional reading: Some or all of Chapter 2, “Homer” in Classical Literature [henceforth CL], pp. 25-56. Week 3: Didactic poetry and lyric poetry Selections from Hesiod’s Works and Days: Pandora, The Five Ages, When to Plow, Summer, Winter (NBCL pp. 191-198) Lyric poetry: Alcman, Sappho, and Pindar’s Third Pythian Ode (NBCL pp. 212-216; 223-231; 258-263) Optional reading: Chapter 3, “From Homer to tragedy” in CL, pp. 57-84, especially pp. 57-64 (some historical background; Hesiod) and pp. 80-83 (Pindar). Material in the shaded boxes is also recommended. Week 4: Historical writing Selections from the Histories of Herodotus (NBCL pp. 267-299) Selections from Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War (NBCL pp. 334- 356) Optional reading: “Interlude: Greek history in the classical period,” CL pp. 85-88 and some or all of Chapter 5, “Historical Writing in the Classical Era,” pp. 134-162. Week 5: Tragedy, part I: Aeschylus Selections from Seven Against Thebes and The Oresteia (NBCL pp. 300-302; 305- 334) Optional reading: From Chapter 4, “The drama of classical Athens,” CL pp. 89-104. (Good introductory material and a section (“Justice, the gods and fate” that deals primarily with Aeschylus’ Oresteia.) Week 6: Tragedy, part II: Sophocles Antigone (NBCL pp. 359-400) Week 6: Tragedy, part III: Euripides Selections from Medea, Hippolytus, The Bacchae (NBCL pp. 404-425); The Trojan Women (NBCL pp. 428-434); Alcestis (NBCL pp. 436-442) Optional reading: “Language and Rhetoric” from Chapter 4, “The drama of classical Athens,” CL pp. 104-112 Week 7: Comedy, Old and New Selections from Aristophanes: The Clouds, The Frogs, and Lysistrata (NBCL pp. 446-476) Selections from Menander’s The Bad-Tempered Man (NBCL pp. 512-519) Optional reading: pp. 123-133 in CL (on Old and New Comedy) Week 8: Philosophy Selections from Plato (NBCL pp. 477-512) Aristotle’s Politics: Book 1.1-1.2 (handout) Optional reading: “Plato and Aristotle” from Chapter 6, “”Rhetorical and philosophical writing” CL pp. 183-194 Week 9: More prose from the 4th century Georgias, Encomium of Helen (handout) Lysias, On the Killing of Eratosthenes (handout) Demosthenes, selections from On the Crown (handout) Selections from Characters of Theophrastus (NBCL pp. 522-527) Optional reading: Chapter 6, “Rhetorical and philosophical writing,” CL pp. 170-177 Week 10: A sampling from the Hellenistic period Selections from Callimachus: Aitia, Prologue (NBCL pp. 528-529) and Epigrams (NBCL pp. 532-534) Selections from the Argonautica of Apollonius of Rhodes (NBCL pp. 534-547) Theocritus, Idyll I (NBCL pp. 547-553) Optional reading: Chapter 7, “Alexandria and beyond.” CL pp. 195-204 .
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