Who Needs Greek?: Contests in the Cultural History of Hellenism

by Simon Goldhill

Overview

Who Needs Greek? is an interdisciplinary study of arguments on what ancient Greece has meant to western culture from the ancient world to today. The battles between artists and literary critics, historians and journalists, politicians and scholars, are often violent, hilarious, and always passionate. This cutting-edge cultural history ranges from ancient Greece via the Renaissance to modern opera, and treats a central question of culture in a way which will intrigue academics as well as a more general audience.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521812283
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	03/25/2002
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	6.22(w) x 9.29(h) x 0.87(d)

Table of Contents

List of illustrations; List of abbreviations; Introduction: shaking the foundations; 1. Learning Greek is heresy! Resisting Erasmus; 2. Becoming Greek, with Lucian; 3. Blood from the shadows: Strauss' disgusting degenerate Elektra; 4. Who knows Greek?; 5. The value of Greek. Why save Plutarch?; Conclusion: rainbow bridges; Works cited; Index.

Editorial Reviews

"A fine performance. Including a full bibliography and a good index, this volume will serve graduate students and researchers studying Greek, comparative literature, literary theory, and even (humanistic) psychology and anthropology." Choice

"Always a masterful storyteller, Goldhill marhshals evidence with elan...[he] has brought contemporary cultural theory to bear on the Classics with singular tact and persuasiveness...these tales are told wonderously well, and Goldhill lives up to his promise not just to trace literary influence but to demonstrate cultural impact." New England Classical Journal

From the Publisher