Powers of Expression, Expressions of Power
Speech Presentation and Latin Literature
1st Edition
Published on 18. November 1999
380 pages
978-0-19-266877-6 (ISBN)
Description
Can a speaker's words ever be faithfully reported? History, philosophy, ethnography, political theory, linguistics, and literary criticism all involve debates about discourse and representation. By drawing from Plato's theory of discourse, the lively analysis of speech presentation in this book provides a coherent and original contribution to these debates, and highlights the problems involved when speech becomes both the object and the medium of narrative representation.
The opening chapters offer fresh insights on ideology, intertextuality, literary language, and historiography, and reveal important connections between them. These insights are then applied in specific critical treatments of - Virgil's Aeneid, of Petronius' Satyricon, and of scenes involving messengers and angels in classical and European epic. Throughout this study, ancient texts are discussed in conjunction with examples from later traditions. Overall, this book uses Latin literature to demonstrate the theoretical and ideological importance of speech presentation for a number of contemporary disciplines.
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11/1999
Oxford University Press
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Content
- Cover
- Half-Title Page
- Series Page
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Acknowledgements
- Contents
- Introduction
- Abbreviations
- 1 Speech and Symbolic Power: Discourse, Ideology, and Intertextuality
- 2 Platonic Formalism: Socrates and the Narratologists
- 3 Speech Modes and Literary Language
- 4 Fictions of Authority: Discourse and Epistemology in Historical Narrative
- 5 The Rhetoric of Epic: Speech Presentation in Virgil's Aeneid
- 6 Ideology and Taste: Narrative and Discourse in Petronius' Satyricon
- 7 Allegories of Representation: Messengers and Angels
- 8 Conclusions and Envoi: Representation and Responsibility
- References
- Index of Principal Passages Cited
- General Index
