Homer and the Artists
Text and Picture in Early Greek Art

A study on Homer, myth and art.

Anthony Snodgrass (Author)

9780521629812, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 22 October 1998

200 pages, 63 b/w illus.
21.1 x 15 x 1.3 cm, 0.31 kg

'Snodgrass's bid for the independence and artistic quality of the Geometric painter is closely argued and outlined with a scholarly eye for detail and a characteristic clarity of expression which makes it comprehensible to expert and non-expert alike … undoubtedly a radical reinterpretation, he has valuably opened up the discussion of this difficult but vital period in Greek art.' Art History

This is a book about Homer, myth and art. The Iliad and Odyssey so dominate our view of ancient Greece that our natural reaction on viewing certain works of early Greek art is to identify them as 'scenes from Homer'. However, Anthony Snodgrass argues that, so far from 'illustrating' the Homeric poems, these works very rarely show signs of acquaintance with the Iliad or Odyssey, seldom even choosing their subject-matter from them. When the subjects do overlap, the artists occasionally give positive signs of preferring a non-Homeric version of the episode. He then attempts to explain why this should be so: despite Homer's unique standing in antiquity, the artists inhabited an independent world, where their own inspirations and concerns dominated their production. It is only the traditional dominance of the literary study of antiquity which has hidden this from us.

1. The prestige of Homer
2. Learning to read in the dark
3. The Geometric artist reassessed
4. Beyond the Geometric
5. The inscribed image
6. The burden of proof
7. The question of composition in art and in literature
Epilogue.

Subject Areas: History of art: ancient & classical art,BCE to c 500 CE [ACG]