This slim volume contains the testimonia, text and critical apparatus for eleven of Menander's less well-known comedies whose state of preservation is far poorer than that of Dyskolos, Samia, Aspis, Epitrepontes, Misoumenos or Perikeiromene. The plays are arranged in (Greek) alphabetical order and include: Georgos, Dis Exapaton, Enkheiridion, Heros, Theophoroumene, Karkhedonios, Kitharistes, Koneiazomenai, Leukadia, Perinthia, Phasma. Therefore, the volume contains the majority of Menander's more fragmentary but identifiable comedies with the exception of Menander's Sikyonioi (see A. Blanchard, Ménandre, Les Sicyoniens [2009]), Menander's Kolax (preserved mainly in excerpts recorded on one papyrus) and Menander's Titthe (discovered in 2004 but still awaiting publication).
The edition of these eleven comedies fills an important gap in the recent textual criticism of Menander, updating the OCT by F.H. Sandbach (rev. edn. 1990) and the Loeb edition by W.G. Arnott (1979–2000). These eleven plays were not included in R. Kassel & C. Austin, Poetae Comici Graeci (1983–), hereafter PCG. In PCG VI.2 (1998), only the titles of the eleven plays are to be found alongside the note: ‘vid. Vol. VI 1’, and indeed VI.1 is listed in the back as ‘in preparation’ but has never made it to publication. PCG VI.2 contains the testimonia and book fragments for Menander, but PCG VI.1 would have involved editing large numbers of papyri, including the eleven plays presented here and the best preserved of Menander's comedies (listed above). Therefore, a new critical text for these more fragmentary plays preserved mostly on papyrus was much needed.
Moreover, this volume marks the final publication by A. who was working towards an updated OCT of Menander at the time of his death in 2010. The loss to scholarship is very great from one who contributed so much to our understanding of Menander, Greek comic fragments, Greek papyri and Posidippus (with G. Bastianini), as displayed in the survey by V. Garulli & E. Esposito, ‘C. Austin. Bibliographie 1964–2010’, Eikasmós 22 (2011), 351–73. There is all the more reason, then, to be thankful that A.'s friends and colleagues saw fit to take on the task of finishing the edition of at least these eleven plays and bringing them to publication. The editorial note lists an impressive group of editors involved in the overall project: P. Brown, E. Handley and P. Parsons, and it is all the more sad to note the death of E. Handley in January 2013. A.'s preface presents a brief but fascinating record of his relationship with Menander throughout his career. It also includes a Latin epigram composed by A. in 1961 for which he was awarded a University medal, which serves as a reminder of A.'s facility and creativity with both Greek and Latin, skills which he used to the full in his work as a textual critic.
At the start of the volume P. Parsons and R. Hunter make clear their respective roles in editing the text and arranging it for publication through the Cambridge Philological Society. This was done along the lines laid out by A. in his preface, which explained that his text does not mark every doubtful and missing letter if there is little controversy about the word. To put it in A.'s words: ‘why not let Menander some day recover some of his pristine glory in an attractive and user-friendly presentation?’ (p. xii). The editors have kept to this, producing a text whose appearance is very different from Arnott's Loeb, where there was far more use of square brackets and dots. A.'s edition certainly aids reading of the text and makes the work more accessible to those who wish to study Menander's text but have less experience with papyri. None the less, I found myself constantly comparing A.'s text with those of Sandbach and Arnott in order better to understand the text of Menander. The different styles of textual editing are most clearly seen through such a comparison, and A.'s choices to include supplements are frequently more bold than Sandbach, for example Heros lines 10–15 and 46–9.
There are some points on which one would have welcomed a fuller presentation of the supplements. For example, at Phasma line 32 (= line 1 Sandbach) the critical notes make no mention of A.'s decision to record Διο]νυσίων (this is the reading of Jernstedt and Koerte also followed by Arnott). Turner and Sandbach go for the more cautious ]υσίων. Given the significance of the presence/absence in the play of such a word as Διο]νυσίων, the decisions of different editors deserved a mention in A.'s text. Cf. E.G. Turner (‘The Phasma of Menander’, GRBS 10 [1969], 307–24), who considers that this line from Phasma: ‘must be ignored. Hudoff puts Διο]νυσίων at the end of the verse. I cannot see its first ν. If the letter were θ or ο, θυσιῶν, οὐσιῶν would result. Or even, for example, δεικ]νὺς ἰών’ (1969, p. 314 n. 14). At Phasma lines 56–56a A. presents the supplement of ἐμοῦ and then τῆς Ἑστίας at the end of the divine prologue, which emphasises the case for identifying Hestia as the prologue speaker. The inclusion of these words, even as a supplement, again has a huge effect on how one reads these lines, and indeed the whole play. Sandbach and Arnott do not include the supplements, nor do they mention Hestia at all, which is perhaps safer in this instance.
The volume adds to what we know about these fragmentary dramas. In particular the new texts of Georgos and Dis Exapaton build on Sandbach (1990) and Arnott (1979), for example Dis Exapaton lines 6–12 and 31–46, 64–88 in A. are not in Sandbach. It is also useful to have an updated Enkheiridion and Leukadia, neither of which features in Sandbach's edition. There are a few errors, but these do not obscure the meaning, for example Phasma lines 35 and 50 are mislabelled in the Greek text, but in the textual apparatus the correct lines of Greek are referenced so that the textual apparatus does not quite align with the text; the apparatus for Georgos refers to line 4 when line 44 must have been intended. The Greek text is clearly presented and well-spaced which helps to make the edition more usable, in keeping with A.'s wishes (p. xii). However, the spacing and arrangement of the text comes at a price: the apparatus is printed at the end of the main play text, resulting in continuous flicking between pages.
Every new publication of Menander contains the acknowledgement that the most recent discoveries are too new to find their way into the publication. And this one is no exception, but in preparing the text A. notes his use of photographic images and digital images, helpfully pointing the reader towards online resources which any simple search-engine query will locate with ease. The references to Mertens-Pack3 are particularly fruitful for anyone to find images of the papyri to explore for themselves online.
From the scholar who presented the first critical edition of Samia and Aspis (1969), the edition of comic papyri (CGFP [1973]), and who co-edited PCG, this final contribution towards our understanding of Menandrean comedy is not to be missed. The edition reflects A.'s customary flair in offering supplements, and despite the associated risks of pushing such conjecture too far, A.'s supplements are clearly marked, so that readers can feel suitably encouraged by A.'s readings to seek meaning in the fragmentary text while also being aware of how unstable is the matter of meaning.
