Homer}}}s Iliad and the Trojan War Dialogues on Tradition [Hardcover]

In this new volume, Jan Haywood and Nao?se Mac Sweeney investigate the position of Homer'sIliadwithin the wider Trojan War tradition through a series of detailed case studies. From ancient Mesopotamia to twenty-first century America, these examples are drawn from a range of historical and cultural contexts; and from Athenian pot paintings to twelfth-century German scholarship, they engage with a range of different media and genres.

Inspired by the dialogues inherent in the process of reception, the book adopts a dialogic structure. In each chapter, paired essays by Haywood and Mac Sweeney offer contrasting authorial voices addressing a single theme, thereby drawing out connections and dissonances between a diverse suite of classical and post-classical Iliadic receptions.

The resulting book offers new insights, both into individual instances of Iliadic reception in particular historical contexts, but also into the workings of a complex story tradition. The centrality of theIliadwithin the wider Trojan War tradition is shown to be a function of conscious engagement not only with Iliadic content, but also with Iliadic status and the iconic idea of the Homeric.

The range is impressive & Iliadic reception processes churn in these pages as diverse post-classical connections and dissonances are illuminated. Bound together then, as privileged, the epic of Homer and the whole tradition of the Trojan War, retold and reiterated, confirm at once their complexity and centrality. The authors show how, over time, what prevails is a conscious engagement with Iliadic content, Iliadic status, and the iconic idea of the Homeric & Summing Up: Recommended. -CHOICE

List of Figures
Note from the Authors
Introduction: Dialogue

Chapter 1: Navigating Tradition
1.1:TheIliad's Poets  Haywood
1.2: TheErra's Poems  Mac Sweeney

Chapter 2: Visulaising Society
2.1: Euthymides' Pioneelƒg