Poetry and Poetics in the Presocratic Philosophers : Reading Xenophanes, Parmenides and Empedocles As Literature

Of the Presocratic thinkers traditionally credited with the foundation of Greek philosophy, Xenophanes, Parmenides and Empedocles are exceptional for writing in verse. This is the first book-length, literary-critical study of their work. It locates the surviving fragments in their performative and wider cultural contexts, applying intertextual and intratextual analyses in order to reconstruct the significance and impact they conveyed for ancient audiences and readers. Building on insights from literary theory and the philosophy of literature, the book sheds new light on these authors' philosophical projects and enriches our appreciation of their works as literary artefacts. It also expands our knowledge of the genres in which they wrote, of the literary culture of the Western Greek world, and of the development of Greek poetics from the Archaic to the Classical periods, exposing the influence of these thinkers on more famous Sophistic and Platonic ideas about literature.ISBN : 9781108843935 Cover Half-title page Title page Copyright page Dedication Contents Acknowledgements List of Abbreviations Note on Fragment Numbers Introduction: Philosophy and Poetry, Truth and Symbolism 1 Aims, Methods and Assumptions 2 Truth, Symbolism and Sublime Perspectives in Early Greek Song 3 Poetics Chapter 1 Xenophanes 1 Introduction 2 Xenophanes and the Hexameter Genre a Epistemology and the Immersive World of the Text b Xenophanes’ Theology and the Language of Hexameter Poetry c The Attacks on Homer and Hesiod 3 Xenophanes’ Elegies a Xenophanes as a ‘Wandering Poet’ b D61=B2 c D59=B1 4 Xenophanean Elegies and Xenophanean Hexameters 5 Conclusion Chapter 2 Parmenides 1 Introduction 2 Poetry and Parmenides’ Philosophy 3 Poetry and Deception a Deception and the Doxa b The Sirens c Deception and the Proem 4 Profound Visions and Sublime Emotions a Seeing the Unseeable b The Vision c Perspective and Character d The Emotional Trajectory of the Poem e Parmenides and the Sublime f Mystic Initiation g The Reception of Parmenides’ Poem h The Emotions and Parmenides’ Philosophy 5 Poetry and Symbolism a Intratextuality b Intertextuality c Allegory and Subtext 6 Conclusion Chapter 3 Empedocles 1 Introduction 2 Religion and Philosophy, One Poem or Two 3 Empedoclean Poetics a Empedocles and His Predecessors on Poetry b Love and Poetry in Empedocles’ Cosmology c Love’s Craft and Empedocles’ Poetry d Conclusion to Section 3 4 Empedocles’ Narratives a The Narrative of the Daimon b Initiation, D257=B110 and the Education of the Singular Addressee c The Two Narratives Combined 5 The Effects of Empedocles’ Narratives a Empedocles and Myth b Emotions and Aesthetics c Textual Visions d Interpreting the Text, Understanding the World 6 Conclusions: Empedocles in the History of Greek Poetry and Poetics Conclusion Epilogue: The Legacy of Presocratic Poetics 1 Introduction 2 Anaxagoras, Allegory and Ainigmata 3 Gorgias 4 Democritus on Literature 5 Democritus and the Sophists on Language 6 Plato and Mimesis Bibliography Index "Of the Presocratic thinkers traditionally credited with the foundation of Greek philosophy, Xenophanes, Parmenides and Empedocles are exceptional for writing in verse. This is the first book-length, literary critical study of their work. It locates the surviving fragments in their performative and wider cultural contexts, applying intertextual and intratextual analyses in order to reconstruct the significance and impact they conveyed for ancient audiences and readers. Building on insights from literary theory and the philosophy of literature, the book sheds new light on these authors' philosophical projects and enriches our appreciation of their works as literary artefacts. It also expands our knowledge of the genres in which they wrote, of the literary culture of the Western Greek world, and of the development of Greek poetics from the Archaic to the Classical Periods, exposing the influence of these thinkers on more famous Sophistic and Platonic ideas about literature"-- Provided by publisher