Description
Book SynopsisLike us, the ancient Greeks and Romans came to know and understand the world through their senses. Yet sensory experience has rarely been considered in the study of antiquity and, when the senses are examined, sight is regularly privileged. 'Synaesthesia and the Ancient Senses' presents a radical reappraisal of antiquity's textures, flavours, and aromas, sounds and sights. It offers both a fresh look at society in the ancient world and an opportunity to deepen the reading of classical literature. The book will appeal to readers in classical society and literature, philosophy and cultural history. All Greek and Latin is translated and technical matters are explained for the non-specialist. The introduction sets the ancient senses within the history of aesthetics and the subsequent essays explores the senses throughout the classical period and on to the modern reception of classical literature.
Trade Review"This agenda-setting collection challenges us to look beyond the 'visual/textual' paradigm and gives us a taste of the fascinating sensual and aesthetic possibilities afforded by the other senses, individually and in concert." - Victoria Wohl - University of Toronto "Previous forays into a sensory approach to the Classical world have been somewhat disparate, and an entire volume on the topic is to be welcomed - The thirteen chapters in this volume range widely from Homer to Quintilian, and flirt with all of the five senses as recognised in a modern western sensorium (vision, hearing, touch, taste and olfaction), individually and in a more multisensory manner." - Digressus: The Internet Journal for the Classical World
Table of ContentsIntroduction, Shane Butler and Alex Purves; 1. Why Are There Nine Muses?, James I. Porter; 2. Haptic Herodotus, Alex Purves; 3. The Understanding Ear: Synaesthesia, Paraesthesia, and Talking Animals, Mark Payne; 4. Aristophanes, Cratinus and the Smell of Comedy, Mario Telo; 5. "Looking Mustard": Greek Popular Epistemology and the Meaning of aneiyo, Ashley Clements; 6. Plato, Beauty and "Philosophical Synaesthesia", Ralph M. Rosen; 7. Manilius' Cosmos of the Senses, Katharina Volk; 8. Reading Death and the Senses in Lucan and Lucretius, Brian Walters; 9. Colour as Synaesthetic Experience in Antiquity, Mark Bradley; 10. Blinded by the Light: Oratorical Clarity and Poetic Obscurity in Quintilian, Curtis Dozier; 11. The Sense of a Poem: Ovids Banquet of Sence (1595), Sean Keilen; 12. Saussure's Anaphonie: Sounds Asunder, Joshua Katz; 13. Beyond Narcissus, Shane Butler; Bibliography
