Narrative has been a major object of investigation in classical scholarship for the last three decades, with the publication of studies dedicated to its analysis especially in epic poetry, historiography and drama (cf. I. de Jong, Narratology & Classics [2014]). Oratorical diēgēsis has not escaped the notice of literary scholars either, but at the same time it may not be reduced to its literary/narratological aspects. Just as virtually any ingredient of ancient public speeches, storytelling was instrumental to persuasion, and the content, structure and effectiveness of oratorical narratives were highly dependent on the procedural and anthropological contexts of their composition and delivery. In this light, it is only fair that a volume on this type of discourse, which by its very nature is on the radar of historians and scholars of rhetoric, should adopt an interdisciplinary perspective.
This eclectic collection of essays brings together a line-up of fourteen contributors from different backgrounds; on the downside, few individual chapters are truly interdisciplinary, and readers from different areas of specialism will be likely to be selective. The volume does not intend to cover the narrative techniques of all orators in a systematic fashion, as Spatharas notes (p. 8), and gives much space to the corpora of Lysias (with two chapters on the famous diēgēsis of Lys. 1, On the Murder of Eratosthenes), Demosthenes (including the Apollodorean speeches) and Isaeus.
In the introduction (p. 4) Spatharas is critical of ‘structural narratology’, as he claims that its approaches are ‘unhistorical’ (referring readers to R. Scodel, in: Scodel and D. Cairns [edd.], Defining Greek Narrative [2014], pp. 5–6) and that its ‘analytical tools … are determined by the phenomenon they seek to analyze, that is, the modern novel’, with the result that the volume is intended to ‘eschew narratological formalism’ (p. 4). These statements perhaps need qualification. First, several contributors to this volume do borrow from the toolbox of structuralist narratology. Second, Scodel's mention of the unhistorical character of structuralist narratology refers to its tendency to abstract from historical situatedness and its consequential shortcomings as a framework for the description of diachronic processes, which may be overcome (cf. de Jonge [2014], p. 6) without getting rid of the structuralist toolkit altogether.
The first chapter, ‘Storytelling in Athenian Law’, serves as a useful keynote essay to the volume. Here, M. Gagarin offers a systematic survey of the functions of storytelling in forensic speeches, which he identifies as a means of (1) establishing facts, (2) establishing proofs or (3) establishing laws. The generalisations presented in this chapter are substantiated by the range of materials discussed, which include Demosthenes, Lysias (with the inescapable Lys. 1), Aeschines, Hyperides and Antiphon.
The next few chapters address forensic narrative from the perspective of traditional rhetorical and historical analysis. C. Psilakis's ‘Storytelling about Laws and Money’ focuses on the figure of Solon as constructed in Dem. 24. The authenticity of this speech is disputed, but Psilakis argues that such a claim may be restricted solely to the narrative about Solon and that the rest of the speech is an unfinished draft. The nature of the evidence makes it difficult to reach a firm conclusion. At any rate, the discussion of the use of Solon as an authoritative figure could perhaps be complemented by the testimony of Aristotle (Rh. 3.13), and the construction of (semi-)historical paradigmatic stories could have been framed within a wider discussion of this cultural practice (e.g. in Plato's dialogues). (This chapter could have had more care in copy-editing; its ‘Introduction’ repeats verbatim much of the ‘Prelude’.)
In Chapter 3, ‘The Devil's in the Detail’, C. Plastow discusses the question of relevance in forensic speeches in general and homicide cases in particular. Plastow starts from the evidence of explicit comments on the matter in extant speeches, which indicate the awareness of an implicit relevance rule, and shows that digressions on the character and behaviour of a litigant (common in non-homicide cases) risked being perceived as irrelevant in homicide courts. Plastow connects the addition of irrelevant details to ekphrasis and enargeia and discusses the narratives of Antiphon 1 and Lysias 1 from this perspective; these notions are explored more deeply in Chapters 10 and 11.
Chapters 4 and 5 share a focus on Isaeus. B. Griffith-Williams's contribution, ‘Social Norms and the Legal Framework of Forensic Narratives in Disputed Inheritance Claims’, discusses speeches that challenge or support the legitimacy of inheritance through adoption. Strictly speaking, this chapter does not examine storytelling itself, but rather expounds the social and legal background of the arguments (and topoi) adopted by Isaeus (as well as in Dem. 39 and 40) in this type of legal cases. Similarly, Edwards, in ‘Deceptive Narratives in the Speeches of Isaeus’, does not discuss narrative as such, but fleshes out the rhetorical device consisting in the speaker's pointing out to the judges that they may be/have been deceived in narrative passages. Edwards profitably adopts the analytical model of C. Kremmydas, GRBS 53 (2013); a clearer presentation of this framework would have been beneficial for readers.
In Chapter 6, ‘The Story about the Jury’, P.A. O'Connell works with a broader definition of storytelling and describes how the Attic orators (especially Antiphon and the Demosthenic corpus) construct an ēthos for, and tell a story about, the jury itself. Among others, this stimulating contribution also adopts a linguistic angle as it seeks to describe the effect of grammatical patterns; this is where it falls a little short of its standard. In particular, the discussion of the use of the imperative does not take into account the literature on its pragmatics in oratory (e.g. C.M.J. Sicking, Glotta 69 [1991]), and the discussion of subordination and oblique cases (which has some precedent in ancient Greek rhetoric, cf. A. Vatri, Orality and Performance [2017], pp. 127–30) implies an assumption of iconicity for these constructions, which would have needed to be spelt out and defended.
N. Sato's ‘Inciting Thorubos and Narrative Strategies in Attic Forensic Speeches’ examines the oratorical practice of inciting thorubos; as such, it falls into line with those contributions that centre on a rhetorical device – of which it offers a useful survey – rather than on narrative stricto sensu.
Chapter 8, ‘Political Ideology and Character Portrayal in Apollodorus’ Forensic Narratives’, is a study of the narrative of Against Polycles. K. Apostolakis's approach has points of contact with those of Plastow (Chapter 3) and N. Fisher (Chapter 12), in that it raises the questions of the length of narratives and of how irrelevant elements may contribute to enargeia. Apostolakis employs some narratological categories (e.g. internal/external narrator), but much in the analysis amounts to the identification of themes and arguments rather than elements of narrative technique.
A closer look on narrative is offered by Chapters 9–12, which exhibit a remarkable consistency of approach and method. E. Volonaki's ‘Reconstructing the Past’ is a study of Lys. 12 and 13 and combines the analysis of narrative technique with that of rhetorical strategies and close readings. On a minor point, the question of the interpretation of ὅτε τὸ πρῶτον at Lys. 12.19 (p. 144) – translated but omitted from the Greek text along with the rest of the sentence – would have deserved at least an endnote (see G. Bolonyai, Hermes 135 [2007]), given its relevance to the emotional effect of the passage. R. Webb's ‘As If You Were There’ and V. Wohl's ‘Temporal Irony in Athenian Forensic Narrative’ are complementary studies of the narrative of Lys. 1, each offering a fresh interpretation of a well-trodden speech. Webb presents a detailed analysis of focalisation and of the description of space as key elements in the enactment of energeia as a means of persuasion. Wohl focuses on time and shows how the speaker's teleological onlook on the narrated story creates a layering of temporalities (that of the narrative and that of the trial) and produces an effect analogous to that of tragic irony: Euphiletus the character is an Oedipus on a quest for the truth, while Euphiletus the speaker is the tragic audience, who knows the truth from the start. Wohl's contribution ends on the thought-provoking note that the newly cynical persona of Euphiletus could reflect badly on the formerly-naïve one constructed by the narrative.
Fisher, in ‘Narrative and Emotions in Pseudo-Demosthenes 47, Against Euergus and Mnesiboulus’, offers a narratological analysis of [Dem.] 47 in an essay in the form of a commentary. Fisher's analysis is insightful and generally convincing. He is probably right in arguing that παῖδες may be accompanied by the masculine article when referring to daughters (pp. 187–8; instances of αἱ παῖδες etc. seem to be confined to contrasts with the masculine, e.g. at Pl. Lg. 813b, or where the noun is further modified by a constituent in grammatical agreement, e.g. a relative pronoun at Dem. 60.27), but could have made more of the narratological function of the imperfect (as contributing to embedded focalisation, p. 195).
Chapter 13, ‘Truth and Deception in Athenian Forensic Narratives’, is an innovative experimental study of the narratives of Dem. 54 and Lys. 3. Kremmydas offers an assessment of the veracity of these passages using a forensic technique (Criteria-Based Content Analysis), whereby nineteen criteria are evaluated by raters to produce a truthfulness score for each narrative. The results confirm scholarly opinions (Dem. 54 is more likely to be truthful than Lys. 3); this is encouraging, but, given its nature, this study should probably have followed the layout of experimental papers and provided more information about the experimental set-up (what is the raters’ background? Under what conditions was the rating performed? Was it performed on the original or on translations of the texts?) as well as significance tests for the statistics it presents.
The final chapter, R. Hatzilambrou's ‘Greek Teachings about Forensic Narrative’, wraps up the volume as a historical counterpart to Gagarin's introductory survey. This essay summarises passages on diēgēsis from Aristotle's Rhetoric, the Rhetoric to Alexander, Dionysius of Halicarnassus’ essay on Lysias (Chapter 18), and the relevant sections of Ps.-Hermogenes’ On Invention and the Anonymus Seguerianus. It is regrettable that the Progymnasmata are excluded from this survey, given that they all counted narrative among their exercises. The fact that exercises in narrative were part of elementary education could form the basis of an answer to Hatzilambrou's conclusion that the importance of diēgēsis appears to be ‘under-appreciated, both by fourth-century and later Greek rhetoricians’ (p. 242). On Dionysius’ virtues of style (p. 237), readers may want to compare K. Pohl, Die Lehre von der drei Wortfügungsarten (1968), pp. 12–15. The volume is complemented by a general index and an index locorum.
