The Lives of the Greek Poets

by Mary R. Lefkowitz

Overview

Mary R. Lefkowitz has extensively revised and rewritten her classic study to introduce a new generation of students to the lives of the Greek poets. Thoroughly updated with references to the most recent scholarship, this second edition includes new material and fresh analysis of the ancient biographies of Greece's most famous poets.
With little or no independent historical information to draw on, ancient writers searched for biographical data in the poets' own works and in comic poetry about them. Lefkowitz describes how biographical mythology was created and offers a sympathetic account of how individual biographers reconstructed the poets' lives. She argues that the life stories of Greek poets, even though primarily fictional, still merit close consideration, as they provide modern readers with insight into ancient notions about the creative process and the purpose of poetic composition.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781780930893
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	07/15/2012
Edition description:	Second
Pages:	240
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.50(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Mary R. Lefkowitz is Mellon Professor in the Humanities, Emerita, at Wellesley College, Massachusetts, USA. She is the author of many books on classical culture, including Women in Greek Myth, First-Person Fictions, Not Out of Africa, and Greek Gods, Human Lives. She is co-editor of Women's Life in Greece and Rome and Black Athena Revisited.

Table of Contents

Preface
Introduction
Hesiod
Homer
Eight Archaic Poets
Solon
Simonides
Pindar
Aeschylus
Sophocles
Euripides
Comic Poets
Hellenistic Poets
Conclusion
Abbreviations
Bibliography
Notes
Index

Editorial Reviews

This second edition is enriched by references to recent studies as well as by deeper analysis.
L'Antiquité Classique (Bloomsbury translation)

From the Publisher

A valuable collection of evidence, information, and ideas.

Greece and Rome

A major book which aims at demolishing the underpinnings of much that has passed for Greek literary criticism . . . its proper application to classical studies will have a very positive effect.

American Journal of Philology