Fashioning the feminine in the Greek novel / Katharine Haynes.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Haynes, Katharine, 1971-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Greek fiction--History and criticism.

Greek fiction.

Women and literature--Greece.

Women and literature.

Greece.

Femininity in literature.

Women in literature.

Physical Description:

viii, 214 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

London ; New York : Routledge, 2003.

Summary:

The Greek novel occupies a special place in the debate on gender in antiquity, forcing us to ask why the female protagonists are such strong and positive characters. This book rejects the hypothesis of a largely female readership, and also sees a problem in ascribing this pattern to the reflection of a blanket improvement in the status of women. Katharine Haynes shows that the strong heroines are best understood not as an undistorted mirror on an improved social reality, but as a type of 'constructed feminine'. Through reference to earlier works of Greek literature, such as Euripides and Aristophanes and early Christian texts, the 'use of the feminine' in the novel is put into its wider context, situating the heroines within a tradition of using the female image to say something about the male self and his aspirations. The heroines are studied in detail, with a focus on how we can approach and understand their combination of conventional with unconventional behaviours. Their male counterparts, rather than being 'failed heroes', are seen as promoting a particularly provocative brand of passive masculinity. A full examination of subsidiary male and female characters 'frames' the protagonists' portrayal and acts as a guide to the extent to which they subvert traditional gender norms. Finally, a study of novelistic marriage examines how the Greek elite has reworked the emblem of dynastic continuity so dear to the Imperial family. By allowing the female to dominate the relationship, and invert the balance of power, this image has been redeployed in a challenging way. The book offers a wealth of fascinating insights into the kaleidoscopic world of male and female in the Greek novel, which will inform and illuminate the reader whatever the text being studied. The related issues of ethnicity and self-definition also explored will be of interest for all those working on ancient fiction or the culture of the Second Sophistic.

Contents:

1 Reading the feminine 1

Framing the questions 1

Readers of the feminine? 2

How to read the feminine 10

2 Contextualising the feminine 18

Finding a reference point

putting the feminine in context 18

Using the feminine

the pagan context 19

the Christian context 30

3 Heroines 44

Negotiating the theoretical minefield 44

Kallirhoe 46

Anthia 51

Leukippe 56

Chloe 61

Charikleia 67

Interpretative strategies 73

4 Heroes 81

Measuring masculinity

ideologically invested assessments 81

Constructions of novelistic heroism 83

Interpretative strategies 93

5 Minor female characters 101

Patterning femininity 101

The female antagonists 102

Mothers 115

Confidantes 123

Marginal female characters 130

6 Minor male characters 137

Constructing masculinity 137

The male antagonists 137

Fathers 143

Friends 150

The male landscape

minor characters and collectives 154

7 Telos 156

Love and marriage 156

Maintenance of the social order 157

Subversion of the social order? 159.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 188-205) and index.

ISBN:

0415262097

0415262100

OCLC:

50285482