Narratology has long become a staple of theoretical approaches to classical texts. While I. de Jong's formalist approach remains important, there have been other attempts to engage critically with the theoretical parameters of narratology beyond G. Genette, such as some of the articles in the collection edited by J. Grethlein and A. Rengakos (Narratology and Interpretation [2009]). Outside of the field of Classics, however, these studies have not had much impact, even though ancient texts can challenge seemingly transhistorical narratological concepts, such as the narrator or metalepsis. The disregard of research in Classics within mainstream narratology is all the more striking given that narratologists of almost all schools and periods take recourse to ancient texts, first and foremost Plato's and Aristotle's ideas about narrative and narration. L. takes issue with this frequent – and often uncritical and superficial – appropriation. Her aim is to contribute to the history of narratology by going back to the precursors of ‘classical’, that is, structuralist narratology and to trace their impact on narratologists in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. At best, such an endeavour can put Classics on mainstream narratology's radar and raise awareness for ancient narrative forms and concepts that require a historically nuanced approach. At worst, it can come across as schoolmasterly critique that claims to have a monopoly on using and interpreting ancient authors on the subject. Overall, L.'s book successfully balances the two extremes out, only sometimes it verges towards the latter.

The project itself, to retell the history of narratology from the perspective of Classics, is laudable indeed and fills a problematic gap in mainstream (classical and postclassical) narratology: Aristotle, and to a lesser extent Plato and Horace, are frequently hailed as ‘proto-narratologists’, yet the details of their narratology avant la lettre tend to be misrepresented. The history of narratology, in this misrepresentation, becomes a genealogy that moves neatly – too neatly – from Plato and Aristotle via Horace to modern narratological theories. L. attempts to set the record straight, not by rewriting this continuity narrative, but by emphasising the role of Classicists’ expertise in its making. In the first part of the book (Chapters 2–5) L. provides introductions to ancient narrative theory and practice: three concise chapters on Plato, Aristotle and Horace and the contexts in which they discuss material relevant to narratologists are followed by a chapter on ancient narrative theory in practice. The inclusion of the practical side of narrative is a much needed addition to the debate. Yet L.'s account leaves something to be desired. The ancient theories and terms are treated in such a dense way that it remains to be seen to what extent they will be useful for non-Classicists. Also, there are very few actual examples or analyses of passages from ancient texts so that the ‘practical’ side of things is somewhat under-represented. Given that L.'s understanding of narrative is heavily influenced by the Ohio School (James Phelan, Angus Fletcher and others), who use a so-called ‘rhetorical’ approach to narrative, one wonders why ancient rhetoric and its understanding of narrative does not feature in her overview as a field of its own. The implicit distinction seems to be that poetics equals ‘true’ theory and rhetoric is subsumed under practice (in the scholia). This is problematic because reductive. What would happen if we were to treat the scholia and the handbooks of rhetoric simply as different approaches to theorising narrative? From a praxeological perspective ‘doing’ narrative means theorising it.

Chapter 5 is the most interesting and also the most frustrating part of the book: it features two sets of sections in which first ancient and then modern narratological terms and concepts are discussed (in the Homeric scholia and the Servius commentaries respectively). At first the alterity of ancient narrative practices is highlighted, that is, those features which do not fit neatly into narratological categories. Upon closer inspection, however, this alterity turns out to be evidence of continuity in disguise. First L. provides a brief overview of the terms used in ancient scholia that cannot be mapped onto the narratological toolbox, including narrative levels and diegesis. Then she argues that the scholia nevertheless work with a concept that equals the narratological distinction between discours and histoire (or syuzhet and fabula, in the Russian Formalists’ terminology). A similar argument is made with respect to Servius. In one of his commentaries he speaks of narrantis officium (‘the business of narrating’), which, L. argues, can be taken as the attempt to describe an agency similar to the narrator even though ancient narrative in general tended to identify the narrative voice with the poet or author. At the same time, she continues, the commentaries reveal an understanding of the different narrative levels of the Aeneid and the different voices they induce, which also includes the voice of a narrator-like persona who conducts the business of narrating. In general it remains unclear where to draw the line between ‘ancient’ and ‘modern’ narratological terms as the latter are clearly taken as the benchmark for the former. I am not sure if it serves the overall debate if the critical appreciation of ancient narrative and its intricacies requires a line of argument that time and again stresses its (real or perceived) continuity with modern narrative theory. Instead of L.'s remark that rounds off this section, ‘This is sophisticated stuff’ (p. 102), I would have liked to see a more thorough discussion of what ancient narrative can contribute to contemporary narratology.

The second part of the book (Chapters 6–11) focuses on the most important strands of twentieth- and twenty-first-century narratological criticism and traces key theorists’ use of Plato's and Aristotle's terminology from Russian Formalism to Poststructuralism and Postclassicism. The summaries of the narratological schools are evidently addressed to readers who are already well versed in narratology. There is much to be learned from L.'s critical readings, such as the striking discovery to what extent the distinction between syuzhet and fabula resulted from Victor Shklovsky's engagement with a particular Russian edition of Aristotle's Poetics. Yet the overall argument is somewhat repetitive, sometimes even pedantic in the emphasis that is put on the continuity thesis. She argues that many, if not all, narratologists have directly or indirectly taken their cue from Plato or (much more often) from Aristotle; knowing how the critics – often mistakenly – read the ancient authors can help us better understand the modern theories, perhaps also explain their flaws. Implicitly, then, the book raises the question of who has claim to power over the theories – Classicists, because they know how to read and interpret the ancient authors, or modern theorists, who lack the philological skills but look for ideas and inspiration in creating new critical paradigms? I have much sympathy for L.'s stress on the (seeming) continuity of an ancient narratology avant la lettre and the importance of Classicists’ expertise. Yet as a medievalist and literary theorist I take issue with such a one-sided perspective: the continuity argument L. spins from the Platonic and Aristotelian terminologies to modern theorists’ use conveniently brackets the medieval period (only the Renaissance, for obvious reasons, is mentioned briefly with respect to the transmission of Horace's Ars poetica). The image L. draws with respect to a genealogy of narratological terms suffers from the blind eye critics turn to medieval narrative practices and their influences on what constitutes narrative, for instance in the novel, today. Nevertheless, I am thankful for L.'s direct and provocative style in starting a debate on the continuity thesis of narratological terms. This is an important book that will hopefully open up the debate between mainstream narratologists and narratologists who are experts in earlier historical periods (or in non-Western cultures, for that matter, or in both) in order to help us see more clearly when and why narrative practices emerged, which functions they fulfilled and how these practices may have shaped our modern notions of narrative, in both practical and theoretical terms.