Folk Poetry of Modern Greece

A wide-ranging study of popular poetry and songs from the end of the Byzantine Empire to the present.

Roderick Beaton (Author)

9780521604208, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 20 May 2004

248 pages
21.6 x 14 x 1.5 cm, 0.335 kg

A wide-ranging study of popular poetry and song in the Greek language from the last years of the Byzantine Empire to the present day. The folk poetry of the title includes the songs, composed and handed down by word of mouth, of unlettered villagers, of wandering minstrels with pretensions to professionalism, and, in more recent times, of the poorer inhabitants of Ottoman and Greek cities. The creative period of this folk poetry covers, at the minimum, 500 years of history and a geographical area stretching from Corsica in the west to Cyprus and Trebizond in the east, as well as northwards into the Balkans. This is not a general or theoretical survey of folk poetry, but an exploration, based on literary, historical and sociological evidence, of a single cultural tradition and the forces which have shaped it.

Preface
Maps
1. Introduction
2. The demotic tradition: the song
3. Structure of the demotic tradition: the formula
4. Structure of the demotic tradition: imagery and themes
5. The emergence of the demotic tradition
6. Function of the demotic tradition: the songs and history
7. The songs as myth
8. One tradition or several?
9. The historical tradition
10. Greek folk poetry and writing
Notes
Glossary of Greek words transliterated in the text
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: poetry & poets [DSC]