Theocritus and Things : : Material Agency in the Idylls / / Lilah Canevaro.

• VerfasserIn: Canevaro, Lilah ,
• Place / Publishing House: Edinburgh : : Edinburgh University Press, , [2023]; ©2023
• Year of Publication: 2023
• Language: English
• Series: Ancient Cultures, New Materialisms : ACNM
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (240 p.) :; 11 B/W illustrations

Foregrounds underrepresented agents (women, nature and the nonhuman) in and through the poetry of TheocritusProvides a new approach to canonical Greek poetryBrings Classics into conversation with burgeoning theoretical frameworksSpeaks to current political concerns about the relationship between humans and nature Decentres the male human subject and listens to a wider cast of characters, offering a ‘from below’ readingThis book contributes to the literary-theoretical field of Material Ecocriticism, expanding its chronological remit, and is the first to apply it to Classics. Material Ecocriticism has been described as an exercise in listening – and it is to a series of underrepresented agents (women, nature, the nonhuman) in the poetry of Theocritus that this book urges us to listen. This ‘from below’ reading that allows nature and materiality their agency, that sees objects and the labour behind them, gives a new way in to the paradoxes of Hellenistic pastoral poetry: the urban backdrop to bucolic poetry, the artifice of the locus amoenus. This book reveals a detailed picture of material agency and a diverse cast of characters human and nonhuman in Theocritus’ Idylls, showing that while the poetry might be paradoxical it is not rarefied. And through a dark-ecological reading it highlights the darkness that undercuts the idyll.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- List of Illustrations -- Acknowledgements -- Preface -- Introduction: Material Agency -- 1. The Cup -- Material Ecocriticism: An Exercise in Listening -- Boundaries: Author, Genre, Tradition -- Oiko-criticism and Dark Ecology: Revisiting Hesiod’s Farm -- 2. The Woman -- Material Feminism: Changing Nature -- Idyll 1: Ekphrasis and Materiality -- Idyll 2: Reading Bodies -- Idyll 15: Women’s Work -- 3. The Fisherman and the Rock -- Idylls 7 and 21: Imagined Landscapes -- Idyll 23: Vital Stone -- Excursus: San Sperate -- 4. The Plaited Trap -- Idyll 1: Creative Matter -- Idyll 28: Emigration and Collaboration -- From Distaffs to Guineas -- 5. Beyond the Cup -- Idylls 6 and 11: His Monstrous Materials -- The Pipes Are Calling -- Slàinte -- A Concluding Excursus: Marsden -- Bibliography -- Index Locorum -- Subject Index