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The Letters Of William Cullen Bryant: Volume V, 1865–1871, William Cullen Bryant, Thomas G. Voss

American Philosophy

On April 26, 1865, as Abraham Lincoln's funeral cortege paused in Union Square, New York, before being taken by rail to Springfield, Illinois, William Cullen Bryant listened as his own verse elegy for the slain president was read to a great concourse of mourners by the Reverend Samuel Osgood. Only five years earlier and a few blocks downtown, at Cooper Union, Bryant had introduced the prairie candidate to his first eastern audience. There his masterful appeal to the conscience of the nation prepared the way for his election to the presidency on the verge of the Civil War. Now, Bryant …

The Transactions Of Mortal Coil: Hellenic Meaning In The Suffering Of The Iliad And The Oresteia, Stephen L. Bothwell

Honors Bachelor of Arts

The meaning of suffering is enigmatic. To grasp at it cosmologically, I examine both Archaic and Classical Greek views of suffering via their primary literature and culture. Homer’s Iliad reveals the transactionality of suffering as it is embedded in the heroic code through an analysis of the Glaucus-Diomedes exchange. An investigation of Achilles’ development portrays both the Homeric system that equates honor and suffering and the unquantifiable suffering that critiques said system. Meanwhile, a study of Aeschylus’ Oresteia exhibits the interrelation of suffering and learning in Zeus’ law. The progression of the trilogy displays an accruement of wisdom by means …

Homeric Time Travel, Erwin F. Cook

Classical Studies Faculty Research

It has been a commonplace among anthropologists since Malinowski that during the performance of traditional stories the listening community experiences the primordial past when the gods still appeared freely to humans. Significantly, this involves not a return to the past, but a return of the past. The Odyssey not only depicts its own hero as a character from the heroic past, in which the gods were intimately involved with the heroes who fought at Troy, but also as one who brings the past with him when he returns home to an Ithaca that represents a greatly diminished present. In so …

Review Of "Homer's Iliad: The Basel Commentary, Book Xix", Rachel H. Lesser

Classics Faculty Publications

Marina Coray’s commentary on Iliad 19, originally published in German in 2009, is part of the ongoing Basel commentary series on Homer’s Iliad, edited by Anton Bierl and Joachim Latacz. So far thirteen volumes of the series have been published in German, and five in English translation. Coray’s commentary is a work of great erudition and will be an indispensable resource for scholars of Homer. Here I focus on the utility of this slightly revised new English edition for anglophone readers at various levels, and consider how this commentary relates to and supplements Mark W. Edwards’ outstanding commentary on …

Challenging Kleos: An Fpda Analysis And Application Of Andromache In The Iliad, Ayana Marie Rowe

Honors Bachelor of Arts

I will argue that through carefully constructed language, Andromache manipulates her status as an ideal, aristocratic woman in order to critique the masculine pursuit of kleos, thereby giving a voice to women like herself who are limited as women in their ability to speak out against the societal norms. I begin my argument by establishing the parameters of an ideal, aristocratic woman in ancient Greece and demonstrating ways in which Andromache fits this characterization. The larger expanse of my thesis is then devoted to my FPDA reading of Andromache’s speeches, and the conclusions drawn from my analyses. My final …

The Treatment Of Women By Achilles And Agamemnon, Erica M. Cosgrove

Student Research

No abstract provided.

Theban Walls In Homeric Epic, Corinne Ondine Pache

Classical Studies Faculty Research

Throughout the Iliad, the Greeks at Troy often refer to the wars at Thebes in their speeches, and several important warriors fighting on the Greek side at Troy also fought at Thebes and are related to Theban heroes who besieged the Boeotian city a generation earlier. The Theban wars thus stand in the shadow of the story of war at Troy, another city surrounded by walls supposed to be impregnable. In the Odyssey, the Theban connections are less central, but nevertheless significant as one of our few sources concerning the building of the Theban walls. In this essay, …

Introduction To The Iliad, Erwin F. Cook

Classical Studies Faculty Research

Sing of rage, Goddess, that bane of Akhilleus,Peleus' son, which caused untold pain for Akhaians,sent down throngs of powerful spirits to Aides, war-chiefs rendered the prize of dogs and everysort of bird.

Edward McCrorie’s new translation of Homer’s classic epic of the Trojan War captures the falling rhythms of a doomed Troy. McCrorie presents the sundry epithets and resonant symbols of Homer's verse style and remains as close to the Greek's meaning as research allows.

The work is an epic with a flexible contemporary feel to it, capturing the wide-ranging tempos of the original. It underscores the honor of soldiers …

A Referential Commentary And Lexicon To Homer, Iliad Viii [Review], Erwin F. Cook

Classical Studies Faculty Research

A 14,305 page Iliad commentary? That is what we get if we multiply the pages Adrian Kelly lavishes on Book 8 with the poem’s dimensions. And, Book 8? This is never really explained, though I suspect the long scholarly tradition that the book strays from Homer’s typical compositional practices and standards is one reason. For Adrian Kelly’s stated objective is to recreate at least part of the rich network of associations available to the early auditors of epic, with the result that Book 8 is shown to be as traditional as any other.

Farcical Philology: Alexander Shewan's Homeric Games At An Ancient St. Andrews, Thomas E. Jenkins

Classical Studies Faculty Research

It is one of the many ironies of the term "philology" that what to the untrained ear may connote a dry and lifeless field of study was once the fightingest of fighting words; indeed, philology has been only recently retired as a field with an especial love for internecine warfare. "Love of literature," it seems, could spawn loathing of fellow literature-lovers, and as philology grew as a discipline and even academic profession, the stakes were high. Any examination of metaphilology, then, must include a glance at philology's discourses of error and detection, of correction and humiliation: philology- if dedicated to …

Friedrich Hoelderlin : Ueber Achill (1799), Sascha Harris

Books/Book Chapters

The article interprets Hoelderlin's short paralipomena on Achilles in the context of the aesthetics and poetics developed in 'Hyperion' (-1799) and the significance of Homer's Achilles-creation.

Heroism, Suffering, And Change, Erwin F. Cook

Classical Studies Faculty Research

Today I will address the issue of identity in the Odyssey. To do so I need to make a few general observations about the structure and content of the poem. It is immediately apparent that the Odyssey is organized by three narrative sequences: the story of Telemachus in Books 1-4, including his journey to Pylus and Sparta, the journey of Odysseus from Ogygia to Scheria in Books 5-12, and the return of Odysseus and his revenge on the suitors in Books 13-24. It is well recognized that Books 1-4 recount Telemachus’ coming of age, and that his journey plays a …

Whip, Whipped, And Doctors: Homer's Illiad And Camus' The Plague, Paula Saffire

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

Albert Camus in The Plague gives a pressing, pitilessly clear description of plague conditions:' We are all locked in a city. The gates are closed. The plague rages inside. The only question is, who will die first? This is the situation in Camus' town of Oran; it is also the situation of the Trojans in Homer's Illiad. And finally, it is the situation of human life.'