Ancient Epistolary Fictions
The Letter in Greek Literature

A comprehensive look at the use of imaginary letters in Greek literature, first published in 2001.

Patricia A. Rosenmeyer (Author)

9780521800044, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 30 April 2001

382 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 2.5 cm, 0.662 kg

'… this new publication is the work of a pioneer.' Gnomon

A comprehensive look at fictive letters in Greek literature from Homer to Philostratus, first published in 2001. It includes both embedded epistolary narratives in a variety of genres (epic, historiography, tragedy, the novel), and works consisting solely of letters, such as the pseudonymous letter collections and the invented letters of the Second Sophistic. The book challenges the notion that Ovid 'invented' the fictional letter form in his Heroides and considers a wealth of Greek antecedents for the later European epistolary novel tradition. Epistolary technique always problematizes the boundaries between fictionality and reality. Based on a process of selection and self-censorship, the letter is a construction, not a reflection, of reality. The author bypasses the question of sincerity for a close look at epistolary self-representation, the function of the letter form and the nature of the relationship between writer and reader in a wide range of ancient Greek texts.

Acknowledgments
Prologue
Part I. Epistolarity: An Introduction: 1. A culture of letter writing
Part II. Epistolary Fictions: 2. Homer: the father of letters
3. Letters in the historians
4. Staging letters: embedded letters in Euripides
5. Letters in Hellenistic poetry
Part III. The Epistolary Novel: 6. Embedded letters in the Greek novel
7. The Alexander Romance
8. Pseudonymous letter collections
9. Chion of Heraclea: an epistolary novel
Part IV. Epistolography in the Second Sophistic: 10. The Letters of Alciphron
11. Aelian's Rustic Letters
12. The Erotic Epistles of Philostratus
Afterword
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: classical, early & medieval [DSBB], Literary essays [DNF]