7. Pindar and Homer, Athlete and Hero §1. Having observed how epic and the ainos of praise poetry can converge as well as diverge, we have begun to appreciate how the convergent kleos of Pindar’s epinician lyric poetry may momentarily collapse the distinction between hero and victorious athlete. Perhaps the clearest example that we have seen so far is Nemean 9.39–42, where the kleos of the hero… Read more
8. The Authoritative Speech of Prose, Poetry, and Song: Pindar and Herodotus I §1. The historiā ‘inquiry’ of Herodotus, like the ainos of epinician poets like Pindar, claims to extend from the epic of heroes. Like the ainos of Pindar, the historiā of Herodotus is a form of discourse that claims the authority to possess and control the epic of heroes. I propose to support these assertions… Read more
9. The Authority of Historiā and the Sign of the Hero §1. The juridical aspect of Herodotean narrative—that it can establish who is aitios ‘responsible’ for the ultimate struggle between Hellenes and Persians—is articulated already in the prooemium of the Histories, in that the purpose of the entire narrative is said to be an inquiry into the aitiā ‘cause’ of that struggle. [1]… Read more
10. The Charms of Tyranny: Pindar and Herodotus II §1. The paradigm of the tyrant in Herodotus is clearly a negative concept, serving as a foil for the moral message of historiā. Yet in the case of the archetypal tyrant figure, Croesus the Lydian, the perspective is not exclusively negative. There are positive sides to the traditional concept of Croesus the Tyrant, and the balancing of his… Read more
11. The Ainos as Song or Speech: Pindar and Herodotus III §1. On the level of content, we have seen some striking similarities between Pindaric song and Herodotean prose in conveying a moral message about the realities of wealth, power, and prestige. The actual tradition of such a moral message can be summed up in one word, ainos, a premier term of self-reference in the epinician medium… Read more
12. Authority and Authorship in the Lyric Tradition §1. Having compared the authority of Pindar’s traditions in song with the authority of traditions in poetry and prose, we are ready to consider the actual medium of Pindaric song as a key to understanding the concept of authorship in lyric poetry. So far we have concentrated on the epinician tradition represented by Pindar. But now we must situate… Read more
13. The Genesis of Athenian State Theater and the Survival of Pindar’s Poetry §1. In the roughly defined chronological span of 650 to 450 B.C. covering the era of the nine canonical lyric poets, [1] Pindar is not only the latest but also the best known for what we have been calling occasional poetry and song. Close behind him are his near… Read more
Bibliography Abu-Lughod, L. 1986. Veiled Sentiments: Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Adelman, J. 1978. “‘Anger’s My Meat’: Feeding Dependency and Aggression in Coriolanus.” In D. Bevington and J. L. Halio 1978: 108-24. Adkins, A. W. H. 1960. Merit and Responsibility. Oxford: The Clarendon Press. … Read more
Published in 1990 by the Johns Hopkins University Press. Copyright, Johns Hopkins University Press. Also available online via Johns Hopkins University Press here. Read more
Acknowledgments This book stems from the Mary Flexner Lectures in the Humanities at Bryn Mawr College, which I delivered in the autumn of 1982. I am grateful to Bryn Mawr College for the invitation and for the allocation of a generous subsidy that has helped make this book more affordable. I offer my thanks to Mary Patterson McPherson, President of Bryn Mawr, to Judith Shapiro, the… Read more
