The Swineherd and the Bow : : Representations of Class in the "Odyssey" / / William G. Thalmann.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Cornell University Press Archive Pre-2000
• VerfasserIn: Thalmann, William G.,
• MitwirkendeR: Nagy, Gregory,
• Place / Publishing House: Ithaca, NY : : Cornell University Press, , [2019]; ©1998
• Year of Publication: 2019
• Language: English
• Series: Myth and Poetics
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (352 p.)

The Odyssey, William G. Thalmann asserts, does not describe an actual historical society at any period, but gives a selective, idiosyncratic, and contradictory picture to serve ideological ends, representing rather than reproducing social reality. The Swineherd and the Bow is an ambitious attempt to apply literary and social science theory in order to reveal Homeric epic as a form of class discourse within the context of early Greek social and political development.Drawing upon recent scholarship in archaeology and cultural anthropology, Thalmann considers the evolution of Greek culture up to the formation of the polis in the late eighth century B.C. He demonstrates that Greek society was already stratified well before that date and that the distinction between an elite and other classes was well developed. Thalmann concentrates on the representation of slaves and on the dynamics of competition and family structure in the contest of the bow to interpret the Odyssey—and, implicitly, epic poetry generally—as an intervention in the conflicts that surrounded the birth of the polis. In the interests of the aristocracy, the poem appropriates a traditional cultural paradigm, enshrined in the story of the Hero's return. The distortions of dark–age reality, he maintains, should form the basis of an historicizing reading of the poem.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Foreword -- Acknowledgments -- Note on Citations and Names -- Introduction -- Part I. Some "Minor" Characters in the Odyssey -- 1. Relations of Dependency: Some Themes and Issues -- 2. The View from Above: The Representation of Slaves in the Odyssey -- Part II. Oikos and Community: The Contest of the Bow -- Introduction to Part II: Competitive Performances -- 3. Household, Honor, and the Violence of Competition -- 4. The Contest at the Hearth: Family Values with a Vengeance -- Part III. Paradigms and Audiences -- Introduction to Part III: Appropriating Paradigms -- 5. The Dark Age and Hierarchy -- 6. The Odyssey as Social Process -- Bibliography -- Index