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Marginal Comment, which attracted keen and widespread interest on
its original publication in 1994, is the remarkable memoir of one
of the most distinguished classical scholars of the modern era. Its
author, Sir Kenneth Dover, whose academic publications included the
pathbreaking book Greek Homosexuality (1978, reissued by Bloomsbury
in 2016), conceived of it as an 'experimental' autobiography -
ruthlessly candid in retracing the full range of the author's
experiences, both private and public, and unflinching in its
attempt to analyse the entanglements between the life of the mind
and the life of the body. Dover's distinguished career involved not
only an influential series of writings about the ancient Greeks but
also a number of prominent positions of leadership, including the
presidencies of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, and the British
Academy. It was in those positions that he became involved in
several high-profile controversies, including the blocking of an
honorary degree for Margaret Thatcher from Oxford University, and a
bitter debate in the British Academy over the fellowship of Anthony
Blunt after his exposure as a former Soviet spy. This edition of
Marginal Comment is much more than a reissue: it includes an
introduction which frames the book in relation to its author's life
and work, as well as annotations based in part on materials
originally excluded by Dover but left in his personal papers on
this death. Now newly available, the memoir provides not only the
self-portrait of an exceptional individual but a rich case-study in
the intersections between an intellectual life and its social
contexts.
Lysias, a resident alien at Athens in the late fifth and early
fourth centuries B.C.E., acted as a consultant for clients involved
in litigation and put into circulation written versions of the
speeches that he composed for them. In the early Hellenistic
period, a corpus of more than four hundred speeches was ascribed to
him; however, literary critics in the first century C.E. formed the
opinion that scarcely more than half that number were correctly
ascribed. In late Roman times, a small selection of speeches was
made without regard for the opinions of critics on authenticity,
and that selection has survived. Our knowledge of the remainder is
fragmentary and indirect. K. J. Dover examines the extent to which,
and the means by which, the work of the individual Lysias can be
distinguished within the total corpus ascribed to him. One part of
the examination is an attempt to reconstruct the entire process of
transmission, from the making of the late Roman selection through
the internal arrangement of the corpus in ancient editions to the
relation between client and consultant at the time of writing. The
other part evaluates the criteria used to establish authenticity:
chronology, ideology, and style. Dover concludes that any demand
for a clear division of the speeches into two categories, authentic
and spurious, is unreasonable and methodologically unsound.
Instead, we must content ourselves with degrees of probability and
treat the corpus as presenting us not with an individual but with
certain aspects of Athenian art and society. This title is part of
UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of
California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest
minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist
dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed
scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology.
This title was originally published in 1968.
In ancient Greece, as today, popular moral attitudes differed
importantly from the theories of moral philosophers. While for the
latter we have Plato and Aristotle, this insightful work explores
the everyday moral conceptions to which orators appealed in court
and political assemblies, and which were reflected in
non-philosophical literature. Oratory and comedy provide the
primary testimony, and reference is also made to Sophocles,
Euripides, Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon, and other sources. The
selection of topics, the contrasts and comparisons with modern
religious, social and legal principles, and accessibility to the
non-specialist ensure the work's appeal to all readers with an
interest in ancient Greek culture and social life.
In ancient Greece, as today, popular moral attitudes differed
importantly from the theories of moral philosophers. While for the
latter we have Plato and Aristotle, this insightful work explores
the everyday moral conceptions to which orators appealed in court
and political assemblies, and which were reflected in
non-philosophical literature. Oratory and comedy provide the
primary testimony, and reference is also made to Sophocles,
Euripides, Herodotus, Thucydides, Xenophon, and other sources. The
selection of topics, the contrasts and comparisons with modern
religious, social and legal principles, and accessibility to the
non-specialist ensure the work's appeal to all readers with an
interest in ancient Greek culture and social life.
Plato's dialogue the Symposium with introduction and commentary.
Hailed as magisterial when it first appeared, Greek Homosexuality
remains an academic milestone and continues to be of major
importance for students and scholars of gender studies. Kenneth
Dover explores the understanding of homosexuality in ancient
Greece, examining a vast array of material and textual evidence
that leads him to provocative conclusions. This new release of the
1989 second edition, for which Dover wrote an epilogue reflecting
on the impact of his book, includes two specially commissioned
forewords assessing the author's legacy and the place of his text
within modern studies of gender in the ancient world.
Marginal Comment, which attracted keen and widespread interest on
its original publication in 1994, is the remarkable memoir of one
of the most distinguished classical scholars of the modern era. Its
author, Sir Kenneth Dover, whose academic publications included the
pathbreaking book Greek Homosexuality (1978, reissued by Bloomsbury
in 2016), conceived of it as an 'experimental' autobiography -
ruthlessly candid in retracing the full range of the author's
experiences, both private and public, and unflinching in its
attempt to analyse the entanglements between the life of the mind
and the life of the body. Dover's distinguished career involved not
only an influential series of writings about the ancient Greeks but
also a number of prominent positions of leadership, including the
presidencies of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, and the British
Academy. It was in those positions that he became involved in
several high-profile controversies, including the blocking of an
honorary degree for Margaret Thatcher from Oxford University, and a
bitter debate in the British Academy over the fellowship of Anthony
Blunt after his exposure as a former Soviet spy. This edition of
Marginal Comment is much more than a reissue: it includes an
introduction which frames the book in relation to its author's life
and work, as well as annotations based in part on materials
originally excluded by Dover but left in his personal papers on
this death. Now newly available, the memoir provides not only the
self-portrait of an exceptional individual but a rich case-study in
the intersections between an intellectual life and its social
contexts.
The order of words in a Greek sentence is much freer and less
predictable than in most European languages. The author explains
and illustrates the principles which govern word order in Greek. He
finds three: the tendency of certain words to take a constant
position; certain types of logical relation between the sentence
and its context; and the tendency to adhere to familiar patterns.
His three main chapters discuss word order dictated by lexical or
semantic, by syntactical, and by logical determinants.
To what extent and in what ways was homosexuality approved by the
ancient Greeks? An eminent classicist examines the evidence--vase
paintings, archaic and classical poetry, the dialogues of Plato,
speeches in the law courts, the comedies of Aristophanes--and
reaches provocative conclusions. A discussion of female
homosexuality is included.
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