Tradition and Innovation in Hellenistic Poetry

Description

Hellenistic poets of the third and second centuries BC sought to mark their continuity with the classical past as well as demonstrate their independence from it. This major study explores Greek poetry of the period and its reception and influence in Rome. The volume covers some of the most familiar poetry of the age, such as Callimachus' Aitia, alongside detailed consideration of newly published texts like the epigrams of Posidippus.

Marco Fantuzzi is Professor of Ancient Greek Literature at the University of Macerata and at the Graduate School of Greek and Latin Philology of the University of Florence. His published works include Bionis Smyrnaei Adonis Epitaphium (Francis Cairns, 1985) and Ricerche Su Apollonio Rodio: Diacronie della Dizione Epica (Rome, 1988). Richard Hunter is Regius Professor of Greek at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Trinity College. He has published extensively on Hellenistic poetry and previous works include The New Comedy of Greece and Rome (0521316529), The Argonautica of Apollonius: literary studies (0521604389), and Theocritus, Encomium of Ptolemy Philadelphus (Berkeley, 2003).

'... this invaluable and endlessly engaging book splendidly reflects their scholarly priorities and pleasures.' Journal of Classics Teaching '... a book so full that it defies summary. ... will undoubtedly become an indispensable starting-point for many generations of students and scholars, presenting as it does the culmination of many years' thinking and writing on the part of both of its distinguished authors.' Hermathena