The Gods in Epic: Poets and Critics of the Classical Tradition

This is the first study devoted to the classical literary tradition as a whole, together with the apparatus of critical scholarship which was part of that tradition. The work of the ancient critics provides some access to the interpretative conventions of the original reading community, while their theories of fiction and genre may also shed light on the problems of the truth-value of epic fiction and the kind of belief that poetry generates. Focusing on the poets themselves, Feeney explores the themes associated with each poet, including the fiction of Apollonius, allegory in the work of Statius, and anthropomorphism in Ovid's work.