This is a splendid book that brings a unique approach to understanding the theory of literary revision in ancient Rome, a topic that admittedly has not received extensive scholarly attention. The terms that dominate the book are textuality, as the cognitive, intellectual production process, and text, as the materialisation of that process. The importance of the book lies in its acknowledgement that the final product always receives the salient position, either because readers underestimate work-in-progress drafts, or simply because they do not have access to them. In any case, G. reveals another life of the text, its Vorleben.

G. provides the reader with a comprehensive analysis of the process of literary revision as seen through certain writings of Quintilian, Cicero, Horace and Pliny the Younger. He offers a meta-literary consideration of these authors and explains their writing process, as well as the final products as a means to examine, understand and instantiate the social forces that affect or are affected by them. G. offers a unique perspective on literary creations and suggests that the authors created a literary shibboleth that not only purports to advance literary production, but also hopes to reconsider and ameliorate society.

G. explains Quintilian's, Cicero's, Horace's and Pliny's focus and concern about revision as a historical necessity. The end of the Republic and the first century of the Principate, according to G.'s analysis, forced authors to politicise and socialise the literary realm. In the introduction G. provides a concise account of his argument, as well as an overview of the process of literary genesis. Based on literary references that go as far back as Solon and Aristophanes, he discusses composition, while he also proves and traces the existence of the practice of revision. He discusses the simplest forms of revision, such as spelling or grammatical errors. More importantly, however, G. substantiates revision's social role, as the author considers the views of the audience, and its intellectual role, as the process of intellection is intrinsic and requires art (τέχνη), according to Aristotle's Metaphysics.

G. offers an interesting comparative reading between Isocrates, Plato and Quintilian and suggests that the focal point of the process of revision for them was the advancement of pedagogy and the procurance of well-rounded civic and political entities. He reads Isocrates' Panathenaicus as an explicit reference to the author's revision techniques. The way he incorporates details about his mental process during the genesis of the text and the consultation of his former student indicates that Isocrates purports to produce erudite and refined intellectual and political agents. G. reads Plato's Phaedrus and Theaetetus in a similar manner. He reconsiders Phdr. 275a–b and the description of the pernicious effects of writing on memory as he reads it in conjunction with 275d–6a, where Socrates demurs at a stale and finished text. G. convincingly argues that Plato aims at a pedagogical aspect of recursive dialogue. He reads Socrates' lack of preoccupation with details and exact quotes in Euthd. 290e, for instance, as an indication that Socrates tailors his responses to his conversant in an attempt to instruct the latter more efficaciously. Finally, Socrates' persistence in engaging Theodorus in the dialogue in Theaetetus is interpreted as evidence of the former's belief in the evolving, gradual pedagogy that one might procure through a dialogue that involves both exploration and self-contemplation. The relation of Isocrates and Plato to Quintilian is not explained, though. Book 10 of Quintilian's Institutio Oratoria, which recognises the perils of over-preparation resulting in a lack of vibrancy during the delivery of the speech, none the less suggests that cogitatio and revision lead to the acquisition of facilitas and that the ultimate result will include a lively delivery as well. Clearly, Quintilian's focus is different and the only obvious connection between the three authors is that they suggest some form of revision. None the less, G.'s careful and well-documented argument suggests that Isocrates, Plato and Quintilian employ aporetic and cogitative revision in the preparation of and as a complement to the final text.

G. next suggests that Cicero means to undermine Caesarean literary and political autocracy. He reads Brutus as an opposition to restrictive Atticism and relates textuality to republicanism. Even though G. provides quotes from Atticus, The Republic and Brutus, and provides reasonable argumentation, it seems that he may be reading a little too much into the text. Cicero's employment of literature as a means to promote his political beliefs cannot be denied, but the idea of continuous revision, as well as the insistence on political innuendos, may indicate an over-reading by G. Still, G. examines Cicero from a perspective that usually eludes the reader. His analysis of semiotics, the consideration of Cicero as a historico-political entity and the eminence of Atticism can be viewed under a different light. For G. literature is constructed as an implicit political realm that does not exist independently from the current political reality.

G. dedicates a chapter to Horace. He first establishes a connection between Hellenistic poetry, the Callimachean ideal and Horace. He claims that, even though Hellenistic poets did not regard revision highly, as it was considered an indication of literary inadequacy, their references to πόνος still denote that they resorted to revision. His reading of Callimachus' ‘feeding the slender Muse’, albeit interesting, seems a bit forced, as G. himself admits. The ‘growing’ of literary merit, certainly refers to the genesis of the text, but it can also involve personal maturity, thoughtful production, reading and even taking some distance from the text, and does not only suggest revision. G.'s compelling analysis of Horace's Ars Poetica and Satires clearly describes the poet's revision process, as well as the fact that he perceived it as a form of Augustan censorship (the creation of an approved writing habitus could guarantee the author a place in the Augustan canon) and did not always welcome it. Horace's habitus included reworking and revision, a sense of incompletion that he did not perceive with the free and unconformist spirit of Cicero. A comparative discussion between the style of the Ars Poetica, the Satires and the Odes would have made this interesting chapter even more consummative and would have strengthened G.'s argument.

Finally, G. presents Pliny the Younger as the only one who successfully made use both of the erudite revisionists and the socio-political elements of the general revision-acceptance, while eschewing, however, the political constraints that depressed Horace. Even though I do not agree entirely with G. when he says that ‘Epistulae are not propagandistic’, since Pliny in 3.5 states that under Nero it was not the time for literary parrhesia, and Trajan is present in the Panegyricus, as G. himself notices, I do agree that he makes a conscious attempt to distinguish between the literary and the political sphere. He is wary of public reception, though, as he asks from his genetic readers to comment on his works, while simultaneously considering the general public as well. His Panegyricus is the perfect example of how he creates a literary world that constitutes a space for renegotiating current socio-political parameters, which also co-exists, but does not explicitly interfere with, actual politics.

This is an excellent book that offers a fresh perspective, as it helps us reconsider and quantify traditional works of literature on a different basis. G. reveals another aspect and a parallel life of ancient texts, one that also includes their genesis. He successfully presents Greek and Roman works comparatively and substantiates connections and continuity. The book can be strongly recommended to anyone who wishes to examine literature historically as the meta-language of politics and society.