Before they were written down, the poems attributed to Homer were performed orally, usually by rhapsodes (singers/reciters) who might have traveled from city to city or enjoyed a position in a wealthy household. Even after the Iliad and the Odyssey were committed to writing, rhapsodes performed the poems at festivals, often competing against each other. As they recited the epics, the rhapsodes spoke as both the narrator and the characters. These different acts-performing the poem and narrating and speaking in character within it-are seldom studied in tandem. Homer in Performance breaks new ground by bringing together all of the speakers involved in the performance of Homeric poetry: rhapsodes, narrators, and characters.

The first part of the book presents a detailed history of the rhapsodic performance of Homeric epic from the Archaic to the Roman Imperial periods and explores how performers might have shaped the poems. The second part investigates the Homeric narrators and characters as speakers and illuminates their interactions. The contributors include scholars versed in epigraphy, the history of art, linguistics, and performance studies, as well as those capable of working with sources from the ancient Near East and from modern Russia. This interdisciplinary approach makes the volume useful to a spectrum of readers, from undergraduates to veteran professors, in disciplines ranging from classical studies to folklore.

About the Author

Jonathan L. Ready is an associate professor of classical studies at Indiana University. His books include The Homeric Simile in Comparative Perspectives: Oral Traditions from Saudi Arabia to Indonesia.

Christos C. Tsagalis is a professor of Greek at Aristotle University. His books include Early Greek Epic Fragments: Antiquarian and Genealogical Epic.

Reviews
A thought-provoking panoply of approaches to Homeric performance...The essays are for the most part of high quality, and the book is beautifully edited and produced, with a very useful bibliography...this is a fine volume of essays providing a variety of ways in to the interaction of performance and text in the Homeric poems. * Classical World *
"This collective volume seeks new angles from which to appreciate the artistry of Homeric epic by bearing down on its mode of performance, that blend of authoritative narrative and dramatic enactment called rhapsody...This volume shows that it can be profitable to consider epic rhapsody both as a popular mode of institutionalized storytelling and as a medium with unique resources for poetic expressivity." * Journal of Hellenic Studies *



Book Information
ISBN 9781477316030
Author Jonathan Ready
Format Hardback
Page Count 440
Imprint University of Texas Press
Publisher University of Texas Press
Weight(grams) 739g
Dimensions(mm) 229mm * 152mm * 56mm