Alexandrian Poetry Under the First Three Ptolemies, 324-222 Bc. With a supplementary chapter by Emile Cahen. Translate by James Loeb.

From the library of Prof. Wolfgang Haase, long-time editor of ANRW and the International Journal of the Classical Tradition (IJCT). - Minimally rubbed, minimal staining on bottom edge, pencil annotation on mock title, otherwise very good and clean. / Minimal berieben, minimale Anschmutzung auf Fu�chnitt, Bleistiftanmerkung auf Schmutztitel, sonst sehr gut und sauber. - CONTENTS: Translator�s Preface -- Preface -- INTRODUCTION -- I. The Museum at Alexandria -- II. An Attempt to assign Dates for the First Alexandrian Poets and Librarians -- BOOK I: ELEGIAC POETRY -- I. The Alexandrian Elegy before Callimachus -- II. The Elegies of Callimachus -- III. The Epigram -- BOOK II: LYRIC POETRY -- I. The Hymns of Callimachus: their Dates -- II. Lyric Style and Composition in the Hymns of Callimachus -- III. Invention and Style in the Hymns of Callimachus -- BOOK III: EPIC POETRY -- I. The Argonautica of Apollonius of Rhodes -- II. The Messenian Women of Rhianus -- III. The Hecale of Callimachus -- BOOK IV: PASTORAL POETRY -- I. The Idylls of Theocritus -- BOOK V: DIDACTIC POETRY -- The Astronomical, Poems of Aratus and Eratosthenes -- CONCLUSION -- The Quarrel between Callimachus and Apollonius of Rhodes � General Characteristics of the Alexandrian School -- SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER: BOOK I -- The Elegies of Callimachus -- The Aetia -- The Elegies -- BOOK II -- Lyric Poetry -- BOOK III -- Epic Poetry -- Iambic and Meliambic Poetry�The Mime; the Diatribe -- Cercidas. - It was while reading Catullus that I conceived the idea of writing this book; from the Latin poetry of the age of Caesar and Augustus I found my way back to the Greek poetry of the age of the Ptolemies.1 Indeed it is impossible to read Catullus, Propertius, Ovid, and even Virgil, without discovering, apart from the influence exerted by the Latin and Greek classics, quite a different influence to which these authors owed certain new ideas, ways of thinking and habits of writing that diverged from those of earlier times. There is, as it were, a break in the continuity between the classical period of Greek literature and the corresponding period of Latin literature ; the latter does not grow directly out of the former. Catullus� poem on the marriage of Thetis and Peleus, the elegies of Propertius, Ovid�s Metamorphoses, his Tristia and Heroides, are not direct outgrowths of Homer, Mimnermus and Theognis, or of Sophocles. In the interval which separates the two classical periods there grew up an intermediate literature which generally goes by the name of Alexandrian. Nothing further need be adduced to make clear the importance of Alexandrian poetry, or to show that anyone who wishes to be conversant with the history of ancient literature cannot afford to neglect one of its most important periods. ISBN 9780890055007