The Odyssey in Athens

by Cook, Erwin F.

• ISBN13: 9780801431210
• ISBN10: 0801431212
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1995-11-01
• Publisher: Cornell Univ Pr

Summary

A study in poetic interaction, The "Odyssey" in Athens explores the ways in which narrative structure and parallels within and between the epic poet (aka Homer's) texts create or disclose meaning. Erwin F. Cook also broadens the scope of this intertextual approach to include the relationship of Homeric epic to ritual. Specifically he argues that the Odyssey achieved its form as a written text within the context of Athenian civic cults during the reign of Peisistratos.
Focusing on the prologue and the Apologoi (Books 9-12), Cook shows how the traditional Greek polarity between force and intelligence (or bie and metis/noos) informs the Odyssean narrative at all levels of composition. He then uses this polarity to explain instances of Odyssean self-reference, allusions to other epic traditions - in particular the Iliadand interaction between the poem and its performance context in Athenian civic ritual.
This detailed structural analysis, with its insights into the circumstances and meaning of the Odyssey's composition, will lead to a new understanding of the Homeric epics and the tradition they evoked.

Author Biography

Erwin F. Cook is Assistant Professor of Classics at the University of Texas at Austin.

Table of Contents

Foreword
Acknowledgments
Introduction	p. 1
Dialectics of Enlightenment	p. 15
The World of Poseidon	p. 49
In the Cave of the Encloser	p. 93
Cattle of the Sun	p. 111
Homer and Athens	p. 128
Appendix 1: Homer and the Analysts	p. 171
Appendix 2: Poseidon and Athene in Myth and Cult	p. 181
Bibliography	p. 195
Index of Homeric Passages	p. 209
General Index	p. 213
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