[Authors and titles are listed at the end of the review.]
This volume contains the last papers from the 4th International Conference on the Ancient Novel held in Lisbon in 2008. Two previous volumes of ICAN IV have already been published in 2011 by M. P. Futre Pinheiro and S. J. Harrison in the same series (Ancient Narrative Supplement 14.1 and 2; see the review of both by Hélène Frangoulis in BMCR 2013.02.09). The present volume contains eleven contributions, all in English, in just under 140 pages of text. The time passed since their submission can at times be felt (see page 33 note 1: ‘revised for publication in 2011’), as most bibliographies have not been refreshed past 2014 (Morgan’s introduction is the most up-to-date, and three authors did complete their bibliography with at least one recent title). Some topics have since been the object of studies that would have deserved consideration. For instance, on Xenophon’s literary abilities, Doulamis’ study could have benefitted from Aldo Tagliabue’s 2017 book on the Ephesiaca in the same series[1], which comes to the conclusion that Xenophon centered his novel on the protagonists’ progression in love rather than on the development of the twists and turns of the plot.
Nonetheless, the contributions shine interesting lights on the very rich topic of cross-generic allusions in the ancient novels. Quite judicious is the way in which the editors, as J. R. Morgan explains in his introduction, ‘side-stepped’ the debate between allusion and intertextuality by choosing the title ‘literary memory’ (xv). Indeed, several types of allusions are explored, ranging from images and verbal echoes (Nobili, Doulamis, Clavo Sebastián, Floyd) to episodes (Billault, Liapis, Pattoni), narrative structure (Montiglio, Suksi), generic theorisation (Marchesi, Pattoni, Mattiacci), and metrical patterns (Floyd).
The articles are organized in ‘basically chronological’ order (xv) of the works, an unnecessary precaution, given the persisting vagueness in the dates of a few novels. Besides, it makes for missed opportunities of dialogue between the papers, for some really are complementary. Unfortunately, these bridges are not acknowledged.
For instance, Billault and Suski both treat the motif of recognition. Billault sees it as an illustration by the authors of the ‘uncertainty of happiness’ because of the ‘power of chance’ (8) over the characters’ lives, including Heliodorus’, whereas Suksi shows that, in the Aithiopika, Persinna is the instrument of Charicleia’s destiny, from her conception to the orchestration of the means of her recognition. Moreover, I found striking that both authors brush over the topic of the intervention of the author and his metaliterary image (Billault 5: ‘But is it really the will of the goddess?’, about Callirhoe’s fate; Suksi 127: ‘she [sc. Persinna] writes her own Aithiopika’), without really pursuing the issue.
Nobili and Doulamis both broach the topic of erotic and nuptial poetry in the novels: Nobili shows how the motives of nuptial poetry are filtered through ‘late rhetorical epithalamia’ (16) and built as ‘narrativisation’ (17) of the lyric source in Chariton and Xenophon; while Doulamis uses the same authors for his demonstration, he comes to a much shier conclusion that Xenophon’s very subtle allusions ‘could be part of a deliberate, inclusive strategy’ to reach an audience ‘as wide and diverse as possible’ (64).
Marchesi and Mattiacci both delve into the Latin novels’ interest in genre definition. Marchesi proposes a reading of three stages in Trimalchio’s dinner that invite reading on the backdrop of Horace’s Ode 1.11, the famous carpe diem poem. She points out that the discourse on imminent death, the dish with a zodiacal decor and, finally, the calling out of the carver’s name Carpe all harken back to a similar sequence of themes in Ode 1.11. Moreover, Marchesi argues, the repetition of carpe signals another meaning of the word in Latin literature, namely the sharp critique. She cites texts from Horace, Martial and Pliny the Younger to bolster the claim that carpere had become a verb closely associated with this function of the satira and that, in Petronius, its repetition should be read as a generic marker intended for the reader. Mattiacci, on the other hand, explains that Apuleius’ insistence on the distinction between soccus and cothurnus is a reminder that the material he treats in a humorous tone is often borrowed from tragic tales and myths, and transformed in comic stock. Similarly, Pattoni shows how the Greek Longus transforms tragic and ‘heroic themes into erotic ones’ (90) and operates a literary ‘contamination’ (95-96) between similar situations across different literary genres.
Pattoni and Liapis both explore the memory of Euripides and the tragic poets in Longus, emphasizing the author’s light-heartedness (Pattoni) or irony (Liapis). Montiglio and Suksi examine closely how the structure of the novels is carefully crafted into meaning by Chariton, who leads the reader to anticipate a dilemma but then cuts short Charicleia’s deliberation by the announcement of a war, and Heliodorus, who places at the core of the plot the action of Callirhoe’s mother Persinna, who writes her daughter’s story, and gives her advice and tokens that will both ensure the complete and happy unfolding of her nostos and recognition.
Clavo Sebastián’s suggestion that the centrality of Chemmis in Heliodorus is a literary memory of the figure of the god Pan is interesting but would have deserved a longer treatment than the nine pages it receives. Lastly, the metric and linguistic considerations on two (but mostly one) byzantine novels do not seem to yield a conclusion that this reviewer can summarize.
The collection of essays gives a good idea of the broad range of angles with which one can assess ‘literary memory’ in the novels, and the fact that papers that waited awhile to see publication still manage to bring new and stimulating analyses on the topic is in itself a tribute to the richness of the ancient novels.
Authors and titles
Marília P. Futre Pinheiro, Introduction
J. R. Morgan, Introduction
Alain Billault, Recognition in the Greek novels
Cecilia Nobili, ‘Similar to Artemis or the Golden Aphrodite’: Topoi of nuptial poetry and rhetoric in the Greek novel
Ilaria Marchesi, Carpe diem, Carpe: Horace, Petronius, and the satirical rhetoric of the novel
Silvia Montiglio, Callirhoe’s silenced dilemma (Chariton 6,7,13)
Konstantin Doulamis, Literary mimesis and amatory rhetoric in Xenophon of Ephesus
Silvia Mattiacci, Apuleius, Phaedrus, Martial and the intersection of genres
Maria Pia Pattoni, Tragedy and paratragedy in Longus’ Daphnis and Chloe
Vayos Liapis, From Dolon to Dorcon: echoes of Rhesus in Longus
M. Teresa Clavo Sebastián, The village of Chemmis in the Aithiopika: Heliodorus’ rewriting of historiographical tradition
Aara Suksi, The mother-daughter romance and heroic nostos in Heliodorus’ Aithiopika
Edwin D. Floyd, Traditional poetic elements in Byzantine verse novels, especially Niketas Eugenianos, Drosilla and Charikles
Notes
[1] A. Tagliabue, Xenophon’s Ephesiaca: A Paraliterary Love-Story from the Ancient World. Ancient narrative, supplement 22. Groningen: Barkhuis, 2017.