Literature and society in the fourth century AD : : performing paideia, constructing the present, presenting the self / / edited by Lieve van Hoof and Peter van Nuffelen.

• Superior document: Mnemosyne, Supplements, Volume 373
• TeilnehmendeR: Van Hoof, Lieve,; Nuffelen, Peter van,
• Place / Publishing House: Leiden, The Netherlands : : Brill,, 2015.; ©2015
• Year of Publication: 2015
• Edition: 1st ed.
• Language: English
• Series: Mnemosyne, bibliotheca classica Batava. Supplementum ; Volume 373.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (257 p.)
• Notes: Description based upon print version of record.

Late Antiquity is often assumed to have witnessed the demise of literature as a social force and its retreat into the school and the private reading room: whereas the sophists of the Second Sophistic were influential social players, their late antique counterparts are thought to have been overshadowed by bishops. Literature and Society in the Fourth Century AD argues that this presumed difference should be attributed less to a fundamental change in the role of literature than to different scholarly methodologies with which Greek and Latin texts from the second and the fourth century are being studied. Focusing on performance, the literary construction of reality and self-presentation, this volume highlights how literature continued to play an important role in fourth-century elite society.

Table of Contents

Preliminary Material -- 1 The Social Role and Place of Literature in the Fourth Century ad / Lieve Van Hoof and Peter Van Nuffelen -- 2 Literary History: A Fourth-Century Roman Invention? / Mark Vessey -- 3 Militia philosophorum : Le rôle des lettrés dans l’entourage des empereurs romains du ive siècle / Bertrand Lan -- 4 Gregory’s Governors: Paideia and Patronage in Cappadocia / Neil McLynn -- 5 Lobbying through Literature: Libanius, For the Teachers (Oration 31) / Lieve Van Hoof -- 6 Texts, Teachers and Pupils in the Writings of Gregory of Nyssa / Morwenna Ludlow -- 7 Unreliable Witness: Failings of the Narrative in Ammianus Marcellinus / John Weisweiler -- 8 A Living Relic for the Vicar of Rome: Strategies of Visualization in a Civil Case / Sigrid Mratschek -- 9 A Hero in our Midst: Stilicho as a Literary Construct in the Poetry of Claudian / Clare Coombe -- 10 The Apostles as Instruments of Social Engagement: The Poetical Representation of the Apostles as a Means of Influencing Society / Roald Dijkstra -- 11 A War of Words: Sermons and Social Status in Constantinople under the Theodosian Dynasty / Peter Van Nuffelen -- Bibliography -- Index.