The Hesiodic Catalogue of Women: Constructions and Reconstructions

Description

The Catalogue of Women, ascribed to Hesiod, one of the greatest figures of early hexameter poetry, maps the Greek world, its evolution, and its heroic myths through the mortal women who bore children to the gods. In this collection a team of international scholars offers the first attempt to explore the poem's meaning, significance and reception. Individual chapters examine the organisation and structure of the poem, its social and political context, its relation to other early epic and Hesiodic poetry, its place in the development of a pan-Hellenic consciousness, and attitudes to women. The wider influence of the Catalogue is considered in chapters on Pindar and the lyric tradition, on Hellenistic poetry, and on the poem's reception at Rome. This collection provides a significant new approach to the study of the Catalogue.

Richard Hunter is Regius Professor of Greek at the University of Cambridge. He has published extensively on Greek literature and his previous titles include Theocritus: Encomium of Ptolemy Philadelphus (Berkeley, 2003), Plato's Symposium (Oxford, 2004), and Tradition and Innovation in Hellenistic Poetry (0521835119).

From the hardback review: '... these papers represent a welcome return to a tantalizing assortment of fragments ... This collection is a welcome sign, signalling ... attention to a complicated and tantalizing set of fragments. ... no student of the Catalogue of Women will come away from this book without a different approach to try out for him or herself, without repeatedly thinking while reading, 'I don't quite remember that fragment ...' and wanting to look at the poem anew.' Bryn Mawr Classical Review From the hardback review: '... invaluable ... The collection of essays offers numerous intelligent ways of reading a fragmentary and influential poem ...' Journal of Hellenic Studies