Includes bibliographical references (pages 179-187) and index
PREFACE; CHAPTER ONE: Homer I: Poetry and Speech; CHAPTER TWO: Homer II: Scenes and Summaries; CHAPTER THREE: Music and Meaning in Three Songs of Aeschylus; CHAPTER FOUR: Poetry in the Latin Language; AFTERWORD; APPENDIX A: Tennyson's Morte d'Arthur; APPENDIX B: Continuity in Mrs. Dalloway; APPENDIX C: The Performance of Homeric Episodes; APPENDIX D: Classical Meters in Modern English Verse; REFERENCES; INDEX.
This book concerns the way we read--or rather, imagine we are listening to--ancient Greek and Latin poetry. Through clear and penetrating analysis Mark Edwards shows how an understanding of the effects of word order and meter is vital for appreciating the meaning of classical poetry, composed for listening audiences. The first of four chapters examines Homer's emphasis of certain words by their positioning; a passage from the Iliad is analyzed, and a poem of Tennyson illustrates English parallels. The second considers Homer's techniques of disguising the break in the narrative when changing a s
