06-19-2012, 11:25 AM
I have been trying to read some ancient Greek novels for some time, but I’ve found that the old, out-of-copyright translations available on the net have some problems. So I went ahead and bought Collected Ancient Greek Novels edited by B.P. Reardon.
The majority of these novels are romances. Most follow a basic plot that involves rich, noble, incredibly beautiful youngsters who fall in love. They are kept apart through standard crises – pirates, shipwrecks, jealous rivals, mistaken identities – travel the Mediterranean, preserve their chastity against insurmountable odds (the women, anyway) and eventually re-find each other and live happily ever after.
They have often been described as ‘penny dreadfuls’ of the ancient world, and I can see why. Most, to be honest, are not good stories. Some are fun adventure novels, if you don’t expect too much. None are as brilliant as Apuleius’s Metamorphoses (although one variant, Pseudo-Lucian’s The Ass, is included). Some are terrible.
I think my favourite is Longus’ Daphnis and Chloe, which is unique in that it is a pastoral novel, taking much from the tradition of Theocritus or Virgil. I’m an old country boy myself, and it is quite fun to read about all the goings-on of the ancient countryside.
Another interesting story is the Alexander Romance, which, strangely, is not really a romance, but a wild fiction about Alexander the Great. In it, he travels everywhere, smites his enemies, rides giant birds and meets dog-faced people at the edge of the world. It has about as much relation to reality as Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter. The one included probably originated in Egypt, because it goes to great lengths to show that Alexander's real father was (rather confusingly), an Egyptian pharoah and the god Ammon. The purpose of this complex geneology was to legitimise Alexander as ruler of Egypt.
Evidently there are dozens of examples of Alexander novels. It was something like historical fiction for the ancients. It is fascinating to read something like this, and to see how the ancients mythologised Alexander the Great. There are other wild ‘travel’ tales included, like Lucian’s True Story and Antonius Diogenes’ The Wonders Beyond Thule.
I think the reason I like these so much is that it is fascinating to read the leisure entertainment of the ancient world. Two thousand years from now, scholars will probably spend much more time discussing Shakespeare than Stig Larson, but today Larson sells many more copies than the Bard. Likewise, these stories were not the cultural pinnacle of Greco-Roman life, but they were very widely consumed. Everyone knew Homer, but these stories are what they read when they kicked back after a long day’s work.
You can also pick up all sorts of interesting tidbits. Some things I learned from these stories:
Anyway, if you like this sort of thing, you might want to consider this book. It’s big – with some 800 pages, and includes nine full novels, two summaries, and eight fragments.
The majority of these novels are romances. Most follow a basic plot that involves rich, noble, incredibly beautiful youngsters who fall in love. They are kept apart through standard crises – pirates, shipwrecks, jealous rivals, mistaken identities – travel the Mediterranean, preserve their chastity against insurmountable odds (the women, anyway) and eventually re-find each other and live happily ever after.
They have often been described as ‘penny dreadfuls’ of the ancient world, and I can see why. Most, to be honest, are not good stories. Some are fun adventure novels, if you don’t expect too much. None are as brilliant as Apuleius’s Metamorphoses (although one variant, Pseudo-Lucian’s The Ass, is included). Some are terrible.
I think my favourite is Longus’ Daphnis and Chloe, which is unique in that it is a pastoral novel, taking much from the tradition of Theocritus or Virgil. I’m an old country boy myself, and it is quite fun to read about all the goings-on of the ancient countryside.
Another interesting story is the Alexander Romance, which, strangely, is not really a romance, but a wild fiction about Alexander the Great. In it, he travels everywhere, smites his enemies, rides giant birds and meets dog-faced people at the edge of the world. It has about as much relation to reality as Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter. The one included probably originated in Egypt, because it goes to great lengths to show that Alexander's real father was (rather confusingly), an Egyptian pharoah and the god Ammon. The purpose of this complex geneology was to legitimise Alexander as ruler of Egypt.
Evidently there are dozens of examples of Alexander novels. It was something like historical fiction for the ancients. It is fascinating to read something like this, and to see how the ancients mythologised Alexander the Great. There are other wild ‘travel’ tales included, like Lucian’s True Story and Antonius Diogenes’ The Wonders Beyond Thule.
I think the reason I like these so much is that it is fascinating to read the leisure entertainment of the ancient world. Two thousand years from now, scholars will probably spend much more time discussing Shakespeare than Stig Larson, but today Larson sells many more copies than the Bard. Likewise, these stories were not the cultural pinnacle of Greco-Roman life, but they were very widely consumed. Everyone knew Homer, but these stories are what they read when they kicked back after a long day’s work.
You can also pick up all sorts of interesting tidbits. Some things I learned from these stories:
- What happened at rural festivals.
- How urban religious ceremonies were carried out.
- Various legal procedures, like buying or selling property.
- The existence of ‘stage daggers,’ where the blade is pushed back into the handle.
- The 'riddle game' the ancients liked to ask each other.
- The existence of financial derivatives. (To make a long story short, a character in one story wants to purchase a contract that gives him the option to buy an asset at a later time. This surprised the hell out of me, and shows that they had quite a bit of financial sophistication. I want to do some more research on this one.)
- What some Roman provincial and municipal magistrates did.
- The ceremonies where descendants honoured their ancestors at their tombs.
- How rural highways were patrolled for robbers, and who was responsible for what.
- Catapults were used as torture devices.
- Little episodes about the life of Roman soldiers in the Greek east, for instance the language problems Latin-speakers faced.
- Similarly, there are echoes of what the native Greeks thought about their Roman ‘guests.’
Anyway, if you like this sort of thing, you might want to consider this book. It’s big – with some 800 pages, and includes nine full novels, two summaries, and eight fragments.
David J. Cord
www.davidcord.com
www.davidcord.com
