Beyond the Second Sophistic: Adventures in Greek Postclassicism

The “Second Sophistic” traditionally refers to a period at the height of the Roman Empire’s power that witnessed a flourishing of Greek rhetoric and oratory, and since the 19th century it has often been viewed as a defense of Hellenic civilization against the domination of Rome. This book proposes a very different model. Covering popular fiction, poetry and Greco-Jewish material, it argues for a rich, dynamic, and diverse culture, which cannot be reduced to a simple model of continuity. Shining new light on a series of playful, imaginative texts that are left out of the traditional accounts of Greek literature, Whitmarsh models a more adventurous, exploratory approach to later Greek culture. Beyond the Second Sophistic offers not only a new way of looking at Greek literature from 300 BCE onwards, but also a challenge to the Eurocentric, aristocratic constructions placed on the Greek heritage. Accessible and lively, it will appeal to students and scholars of Greek literature and culture, Hellenistic Judaism, world literature, and cultural theory.

Table of Contents:
Preface Acknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction: Beyond the Second Sophistic and into the Postclassical PART ONE. FICTION BEYOND THE CANON 1. The “Invention of Fiction” 2. The Romance of Genre 3. Belief in Fiction: Euhemerus of Messene and the Sacred Inscription 4. An I for an I: Reading Fictional Autobiography 5. Metamorphoses of the Ass 6. Addressing Power: Fictional Letters between Alexander and Darius 7. Philostratus’s Heroicus: Fictions of Hellenism 8. Mimesis and the Gendered Icon in Greek Theory and Fiction PART TWO. POETRY AND PROSE 9. Greek Poets and Roman Patrons in the Late Republic and Early Empire 10. The Cretan Lyre Paradox: Mesomedes, Hadrian, and the Poetics of Patronage 11. Lucianic Paratragedy 12. Quickening the Classics: The Politics of Prose in Roman Greece PART THREE. BEYOND THE GREEK SOPHISTIC 13. Politics and Identity in Ezekiel’s Exagoge 14. Adventures of the Solymoi References Index

About the Author :
Tim Whitmarsh is Professor of Ancient Literatures, Corpus Christi College, Oxford University.

Review :
"Highly recommended." "Beyond the Second Sophistic is a quietly passionate and intellectually complex book...The world of late ancient Greek literature is a profoundly exciting and deceptive one, and there is no better guide to it working today than Tim Whitmarsh." "This collection of essays is a treasure-house of insights, shaped within a sometimes polemical template which will surely shift the discourse and the future of scholarship on imperial Greek literature." "Scholarly yet lucid. . . .This collection will be a treat to anyone seriously interested in the cultural and literary history of the ancient world and its reception."