First published in 1993. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This collective work represents the cutting edge of critical thinking on Greek and Roman literature in America today. The essays bridge the gap between classical studies and current work on modern European literature by addressing a spectrum of authors, genres, and literary problems, from archaic Greece to late antiquity and beyond. The contributors share no single theoretical vantage point, except for the belief that methodological self-consciousness and rigor produce the strongest criticism. Each of the essays instructs the reader generally about the enterprise of literary criticism by demonstrating procedures useful to the close reading of ancient texts. Although each piece stands independently on its own merits, it is as a whole that the essays make the strongest statement. The volume is organized by theoretical issue, with introductions to each section.