In this volume, a revision of his 2009 doctoral dissertation, M. focuses on the extant choral lyrics of the most prolific and, as many would claim, most difficult poet of the Archaic Greek period, in order to illustrate the historical development of a tradition that is specifically representative of what eventually comes to be understood as literature. In addition to shedding important light on the singular achievements of Pindaric lyric, the work further places the poet's production within a broader historical context, which outlines how a concept of what today we would call ‘literariness’ first began to take shape. For its theoretical astuteness, historical erudition and philological rigour, the study constitutes a brilliant accomplishment, an exceptional work of scholarship that ought to have a major impact not only in Classical Studies but also in Literary Historical Studies as a whole.
The key component of M.’s argument is to identify Pindar as a transitional figure, positioned at the threshold between an earlier oral-communal tradition and a later one marked by individual creativity. This fundamental move, characterising Pindar's epinikia as intermediary, is in itself a rather innovative gesture, and one that serves M.’s narrative very well. The ensuing analyses of Pindar's art delineate four major features that define literariness: ‘(1) the principle of individual authorship; (2) the use of ad hoc, original imagery, particularly as a conceptual tool; (3) extensive appropriation of social discourses as resources for poetic authority; and (4) genre hybridization’ (p. 12). These four areas of concern not only organise the book's chapters, but also refine notions of literariness by engaging in historically specific investigations that move well beyond conventional ideas of authorial originality and poetic self-referentiality – that is, beyond the key components that have motivated ahistorical approaches to literature, for example those popularised by Russian Formalism, Czech Structuralism and American New Criticism. The result is an outline for a decidedly ‘Historical Poetics’, one that ‘views literary forms as sedimented responses to the social world, perpetuated beyond their moment of origination’ (p. 32).
Each chapter is noteworthy for its clear vision and theoretical motivation. Following a general introduction, the first chapter, ‘Authors, Forms, and the Creation of a Literary Culture’, delineates Pindar's contribution to creating a literary culture in Archaic Greece, particularly by proffering the name of the individual author as a literary marker. As a corollary to this argument, M. develops a ‘hermeneutics of stratification’, which aims to uncover the non-synchronous coincidence of past and future forms within the poetic texture. By linking the author's identification together with the establishment of literary forms, M. shows how the name Pindar came to serve as a recognisable guide for introducing a modicum of stability within a fairly dynamic performance tradition. As his discussion of Olympian 1 and Pythian 11 demonstrates, M. unquestionably possesses a command of Pindaric scholarship, which he handles with a wonderful talent for presenting critical accounts comprehensively and judiciously. That said, and despite M.’s explicit claims to the contrary, the readings of selected poetic passages, although discerning in a philological sense, tend to rest content with identifying formal elements in the epinikia, ultimately offering little by way of literary interpretation. It comes as no surprise that M. refrains from reading a single ode in its entirety. As a consequence, the analyses frequently appear as overly schematic, adducing poetic and discursive details to serve the theoretical argument at hand.
M.’s presentation is perhaps at its most schematic in the second chapter, ‘Image, Metaphor, Concept: the Semantics of Poetic Language’, which focuses on the role of specific metaphors and concepts that convey the meaning and scope of this new literary culture. Here, M. takes a significant cue from the Soviet Classicist Olga Freidenberg, who developed a strong theory of poetic metaphor in Ancient Greek literature as a device midway between the mythological image and the philosophical concept. Although highly heuristic, Freidenberg's primary insight, which was guided by folklore theorists, is adopted far too uncritically. Eager to validate the theory, M. neglects other poetic details that might compromise the central claim. Nonetheless, Freidenberg's model does enable M. to discern patterns of thought otherwise overlooked or underappreciated by Pindarists. For example, the comparative overview of the ‘genealogical metaphor’, where abstract concepts are defined by means of ideational parentage in Hesiod, Pindar and Plato is altogether intriguing and discloses a highly convincing pattern from one author to the next. The persuasiveness of this exposition, however, relies once again on an extremely schematic account that rigorously distinguishes Pindar's ‘literary usage’ from Hesiod's earlier ‘mythopoeic usage’ and Plato's later ‘philosophical usage’. M. elaborates this trajectory at greater length in his article, ‘From (Theogonic) Mythos to (Poetic) Logos: Reading Pindar's Genealogical Metaphors after Freidenberg’ (JANER 12 [2012]). In both cases, although the clarity of M.’s argument is perfectly laudable, it remains questionable whether the texts under investigation can be characterised in a fashion so unambiguously drawn.
To be sure, a closer consideration of the complexities of Greek poetry and prose as a whole would have obscured the distinctions being posited; but it is precisely complications of this sort that could have led to somewhat more nuanced conclusions. While it is clear that much of Hesiod's Theogony deploys the genealogical metaphor in a ‘mythopoeic’ manner, there are many episodes – above all, the Prometheus and subsequent Pandora episodes – which arguably interrupt the programme that is outlined in Freidenberg's (and M.’s) analysis. A turn instead to the work of Clémence Ramnoux on Hesiod (La nuit et les enfants de la nuit [1959]), which is roughly contemporaneous with Freidenberg's work, would, for example, readily demonstrate the limitations of the Freidenbergean thesis. Similar comments, with reference to a far more extensive bibliography, could be made regarding Plato's intellectual genealogies. Diotima's well-known narrative of the parentage of Eros in the Symposium is a prime example of how the philosopher exceeds the ‘philosophical usage’ of mythic images. As a consequence, M.’s position on the distinct literariness of Pindar's œuvre is ostensibly less stable than he would like to maintain.
This general critique, however, should in no way detract from the merits of M.’s astonishing accomplishment. The third chapter, ‘Speech Acts, Social Personas, and Poetic Veridiction’, which reflects on how social discourses are interwoven into epinician poetry, and the final chapter, ‘Genre Hybridity and the Literary Artifact’, which ascribes to Pindar the capacity to synthesise various genre expectations within the poetic text, are well conceived and cogently formulated. Particularly striking is the discussion of the emergence of poetry in the Archaic period as an active participant in the social world, which positions poetic authority as a figure able to bear witness to communal circumstances. Attending to this function requires precisely the kind of literary-historical orientation that M. consistently distinguishes from a purely literary-critical one.
Throughout this study, M. proves himself to be a formidable philologist, fully equipped with all the methods and acumen that one would expect from a seasoned classicist. Moreover, he beautifully enhances interpretations of Archaic Greek usage by adducing illuminating approaches derived from formalist, structuralist and even post-structuralist thinkers – an achievement that is bound to resonate with a broad range of literary scholars. M.’s treatment of linguistic evidence, interpreted from a boldly comparatist, culturally historical standpoint, is exceptional and often supremely compelling. The product of exacting and exhaustive research, together with a pronounced theoretical standpoint, this volume provides an extremely helpful assessment of the historical position of the Victory Songs, situated at the threshold between pre-literary oral performance and authorially marked discourse.
