Ancient Works Analysis - section 3

Question 1

The Iliad, Homer

Answer 1

1. In antiquity, there is no text for homer, the Iliad took form over hundreds of years as Bards composed and recomposed the story through oral poetry
2. The Iliad tells the story of a man who gets what he wants but is unable to live with it
   - There is a narrative arc of how the anger of Achilles evolves; by the end of the story, Achilles and his rage are terrifying and no longer of human capabilities because he is so consumed by grief and guilt
3. Depicts the importance of recognition and how things/wealth/power directly contribute to the amount of recognition one receives

Question 2

The Hymn of Demeter, Homeric Hymns

Answer 2

1. Significant themes: grief, motherhood, rebellion, the ruling of Zeus
2. The story of Persephone and Demeter reflects the lived experiences of many women in antiquity, the way in which Persephone becomes a bride violates her autonomy but her perspective is not entertained in this story
   - The conclusion of the hymn: Hades gets a bride as he wished, Zeus has Demeter return to her office of fertility and agriculture, Demeter is able to reunite with her daughter, but Persephone does not get what she wants because she is now a bride and has had her innocence ripped away from her without her consent.

Question 3

Selections from Elegy 2, Anacreon

Answer 3

1. Immediately he Establishes a poetic agenda that be symposium is a place for a good time, he will not write for warfare
2. As a performance context, Anacreon’s Elegy explores themes of desire, intimacy and references Eros throughout as it was expected to be confronted by him and lose to him and temptation
3. His poetry can be crude regarding his perspective of women and of desire
   - boys: Anacreon falls to the temptation of a younger male and since Anacreon is older, his willingness to be controlled or let go of control is not commonly heard of
   - girls: Uses animalistic metaphors to describe young unmarried women Who need to be trained or “broken in” to be useful

Question 4

Lyric Selections, Alcaeus

Answer 4

1. His poetry is in part why contemporary historians associate politics with a symposium, His work revolves most around political discourse
2. Alcaeus informs us of the state of politics during his time, however, having lyrical poetry
   be historically accurate was not a requirement (his retelling has questions of accuracy)
3. Discussing potential betrayals to the polis, how alcohol can reveal a truer version of a person even though it may not be a clear interpretation of them

Question 5

Lyrics Selections, Alcman

Answer 5

1. Is known for writing a poem that involves him imagining his own success as a poet
2. Well he includes elements of self deprecation, he imagines he is so successful that he is able to gift others items of immense wealth
   - Parallels the symposium in that he brags about his wealth and yet restrains himself by being self deprecating and by being generous with his peers

Question 6

Lyric Selections, Sappho

Answer 6

1. Is not limited to one specific performance context
2. She is significant as she can assume male discourse but transform it into something more subtle and nuanced
   - She presents a vulnerability in her writing and a preference for love rather than war
3. She is aware of her audience and that it’s predominantly male and she’s aware of their expectations of her and yet she still chooses to write about love instead of warfare

Question 7

Selections, Theognis

Answer 7

1. Theognis addresses his love, Cyrnus, and discusses how ancestry has become polluted and how money cannot substitute the lack of noble ancestry
2. Theognis laments about the rise of status for commoners and how they do not share the same values as aristocratic families so things such as
   swindling and treachery are now rampant in society
3. The two most important things for aristocrats is to help your friends and to harm your enemies, this ideology is exactly what Theognis is attempting to communicate to Cyrnus

Question 8

Selections, Solon

Answer 8

1. More political than Theognis, He came to power in Athens during a great social upheaval
   - He was voted into power by the Athenians to reform the laws which came to be known as the reforms of Solon (594 BCE)
2. The biggest reform he enacted was that Athenian citizens were no longer allowed to be enslaved by other citizens
   - He also changed the requirements for what it meant to be a citizen of Athens
3. He attempted to find a compromise between the elite and the poor where the elite would still have more opportunities and advantages while the poor would have their own basic rights and privileges for being citizens

Question 9

Antigone, Sophocles

Answer 9

1. Ask the audience what it means to be right? To be just and moral?
2. Antigone is a tragedy centered in harm- many people are harmed in many ways by many things
3. The dynamic seen between Polynices and Eteocles depicts the aristocratic ideology of Theognis: Help your friends, harm your enemies
4. Although harm is everywhere, one of the central themes is love (i.e. Ismene and Antigone)
   - However even actions that are helpful can be interpreted as an attack, and actions that will cause harm can still be perceived as helpful
5. To the ancient Greeks, tragedy is what occurs when someone gets what they want or rather, tragedy is what someone does to themself
6. An ancient audience was often familiar with the mythological figures depicted in tragedy, but ancient audiences were unsure of how Antigone’s myth would end
   - The story of Antigone and how she rebels against the law of Kreon appears to have been invented by Sophocles
7. Antigone, a woman, is placed at the heart of this play. Sophocles differentiated himself from other playwrights because of this artistic choice

Question 10

Medea, Euripides

Answer 10

1. Medea is more of a hero according to the themes of mythological heroes than Jason is
   - She is more powerful, she heavily ascribes to aristocratic ideologies, she is more disconnected from various communities
2. Medea uses her children as the mechanism for her revenge and anger
   - The murder of her children further solidifies Medea’s adherence to aristocratic ideologies:
   – help one’s friends and harm one’s enemies AND
   –the best life lived is to have never lived at all but if you must be born, it is best to die as quickly as possible (the death of her children is an act of mercy by Medea)

Question 11

On the Murder of Eratosthenes, Lysias

Answer 11

1. This work is a form of forensic oratory
   - Making an argument for or against something with the goal of determining the facts of a matter
2. In ancient Athens, murder was permitted if a citizen caught an adulterer having sex with their wife, children, concubine, enslaved people etc… but the citizen had to see them in bed together for it to count
3. Part of Lysias’ argument is that if an adulterer would go unpunished, that behavior is encouraged which results in questions regarding paternity and suspicion regarding the stability of the family
   - At one point in Athens to be an Athenian citizen was to have two Athenian parents
4. Communities are built on the foundational social unit of a family, so the family must be preserved
   - If the family becomes corrupted, the community becomes corrupted

Question 12

Panegyricus, Isocrates II

Answer 12

1. This is powerful speech written by Isocrates that serves both a deliberative and epideictic function
   - Isocrates is targeting political arenas as well as offers political advice
   - He is also praising the unity of the Greeks as well as himself as a speaker
2. Isocrates was a sophist, someone who offers to teach for a fee
   - he is marketing himself as being skilled in persuasive speech and able to teach that skill to others
3. Argues that the Greeks need to come together to get rid of the Persians for good, there needs to be a polis which leads the Greek people
   - He argues that it should be Athens instead of Sparta as this speech was published after the Persian Wars (Athens obtained more military wins than Sparta)

Question 13

The Histories, Herodotus

Answer 13

1. The story of Candaeles and Gyges is paradigmatic for the Greek perspective of moderation
   - i.e. the tallest tree gets struck with lightening (to reach great wealth means that you will face restoration and fall from grace)
2. Herodotus is pioneering something that is simultaneously incredibly radical AND thoroughly traditional
   - Herodotus comes to a familiar conclusion regarding the legitimacy of this Greek perspective of wealth
   - Herodotus conducts an investigation and records his findings which is an entirely new methodology
3. Xerxes depicts the same pattern of how the proud will be brought low.
   - there is a moral structure to his Histories and he is more willing to introduce aspects of religious thinking since he believes truth can be transmitted through tradition
4. He believes the Histories details not only how the Greeks are victorious in the war but how their perspective is correct

Question 14

A Comprehensive Guide to the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides

Answer 14

1. He is not interested in supernatural events or divinity, he approaches history in a very clinic way
   - He is famous for wanting to document the plague while not understanding it (there is a desire to record events as accurately as possible so that this record can be viewed in the future if the same events were to occur
2. He wants his record of the Peloponnesian war to be authoritative and accurate
   - A new literary interest in fixing/archiving truth, moving away from myth/epics
   - it is a scientific history in that he wants to determine the series of events through his own analysis
3. He is also describing how the quality of Athenian discourse deteriorates over time
   - pondering what led to the decline of a once great and prosperous community

Question 15

On Airs, Waters and Places, Hippocrates

Answer 15

1. Hippocrates categorizes people by believing that correlation is causation
   - his medicine makes assumptions about an entire group of people based on their location
2. A form of archival prose in that he wants to create a handbook of contemporary knowledge to assist future physicians
3. Religion is often not included in his handbook, he would rather look at tangible, physical contributing factors
4. Health and culture are intertwined to Hippocrates

Question 16

Encomium of Helen, Gorgias

Answer 16

1. Gorgias seeks to remove some blame from Helen, a radical topic for epideictic oratory
   - everyone blames Helen for the Trojan War, if he can persuade audiences to remove blame from Helen, it proves his oratorical prowess as well as markets his abilities to potential students
2. His writing style is symmetrical and poetic
   - he applies poetic devices and techniques to the genre of prose
3. Female agency remains suppressed, men and speech have power
   - Helen’s autonomy and personal authority is not entertained in Gorgias’ speech
   - It is Gorgias (the speech writer), the gods (who may have compelled Helen) and Paris (who may have persuaded or forcibly taken Helen) who have agency

Question 17

Lucius or the Ass, Lucian

Answer 17

1. The geography mentioned throughout the story would be familiar to an ancient audience but the aspect of Lucius transforming by use of magic would be unfamiliar
2. The story focuses on bodies, the harm inflicted onto them and a lack of autonomy
   - Through transformation Lucius’ status, treatment, body, characteristics and speech is altered
3. Reflective of a Roman ideal that to be a citizen means having total autonomy and independence, to lose those aspects means you are no longer a citizen or free
   - Lucius ceases to be human and is instead forced to endure
   - Enslaved people were seen as “sub-human” in antiquity
   - Bodily autonomy is necessary for masculinity, to be a free man in ancient Rome

Question 18

True Histories, Lucian

Answer 18

1. Scholarship flourishes during the Hellenistic and Roman period
   - poetry from these periods are extremely refined and learned, a series of in jokes
   - the poetry speaks to people who have read the same poetry and done the same work as the author, it is a question of membership
2. His True Histories is a parody of Herodotus and other ancient authors
   - Although presented as a silly story, True Histories invites its readers to understand the references he makes
3. Lucian treats Greek literature as an object that he can learn about and master
   - He writes in and mimics the same Greek spoken during 5th Athens even though that dialect of Greek is no longer used and Greek is not his native language
   - The very act of reading his story involves Lucian taking the reader back to Classical Athens

Question 19

From the Clouds, Aristophanes

Answer 19

1. Portrays a caricature of Socrates
   - although untrue, Socrates is depicted as an Athiest, a radical, a scientist (in seeking to understand how the world works by use of rationality)
2. Believes that parody and comedy are important tools in literature because they can tackle serious issues while also disarming them

Question 20

Apology, Plato

Answer 20

1. The background historical context is one of decline in Athenian morality
   - it recounts the 399BCE trial of Socrates, previously there was the reign of the 30 tyrants, Spartan victory against Athens, and the premiering of Aristophanes the Clouds
2. Socrates refuses to corrupt his soul by saving his body upon his guilty verdict
   - He thought that interrogating the public was a way of encouraging Athenians to preserve the purity of their own souls (instead it was viewed as questioning Athenian values and discredited those with social authority)
3. While there is an attempted by the prosecution to depict Socrates as an outsider and anti-Athenian, platonic Socrates is incredibly Athenian
   - He refuses to escape his punishment of death even though he believes it to be unjust since he thinks it would be contradictory to now decide that Athenian law does not apply to him
   - He cannot fathom dying somewhere that isn’t Athens

Question 21

Aetia, Callimachus

Answer 21

1. Reminiscent of archival prose and older canonical epics but simultaneously being innovative
   - Callimachus is assembling a body of knowledge of explanations of mythological figures
   - Chooses not to write in prose and writes about lesser known myths
2. Rather than oral traditions or divine authority, his sources come the library
   - He is a poet and a scholar that worked in the library and looked for his sources
3. He believes that good poetry is refined and elegant
   - Instead of providing lengthy books, he writes poems that are insightful and lean in mass
4. He engages in tradition by criticizing it but is unable to escape it entirely
   - He deliberately evokes the work of his predecessors but inverts it