Greek Laughter and Tears: Antiquity and After

Description

What makes us laugh and cry, sometimes at the same time? How do these two primal, seemingly discrete and non-verbal modes of expression intersect in everyday life and ritual, and what range of emotions do they evoke? How may they be voiced, shaped, and coloured in literature and liturgy, art, and music? Bringing together scholars from diverse periods and disciplines of Hellenic and Byzantine studies, this volume explores the shifting shapes and functions of laughter and tears.  Read more... FM......Page 1 CONTENTS......Page 5 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS......Page 8 PREFACE......Page 11 NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS......Page 15 INTRODUCTION......Page 19 LAUGHTER AND TEARS IN EARLY GREEK LITERATURE......Page 43 IMAGINING DIVINE LAUGHTER IN HOMER AND LUCIAN......Page 52 PARODY, SYMBOL AND THE LITERARY PAST IN LUCIAN......Page 70 ‘TANTALUS EVER IN TEARS’: THE GREEK ANTHOLOGY AS A SOURCE OF EMOTIONS IN LATE ANTIQUITY......Page 89 ‘DO YOU THINK YOU’RE CLEVER? SOLVE THIS RIDDLE, THEN!’ THE COMIC SIDE OF BYZANTINE ENIGMATIC POETRY......Page 101 PHILOGELOS: AN ANTI-INTELLECTUAL JOKE-BOOK......Page 118 ‘MESSAGES OF THE SOUL’: TEARS, SMILES, LAUGHTER AND EMOTIONS EXPRESSED BY THEM IN BYZANTINE LITERATURE......Page 137 TOWARDS A BYZANTINE THEORY OF THE COMIC?......Page 158 STAGING LAUGHTER AND TEARS: LIBANIUS, CHRYSOSTOM AND THE RIOT OF THE STATUES......Page 178 LAMENTING FOR THE FALL OF JERUSALEM IN THE SEVENTH CENTURY CE......Page 199 GUIDING GRIEF: LITURGICAL POETRY AND RITUAL LAMENTATION IN EARLY BYZANTIUM......Page 211 MIME AND THE DANGERS OF LAUGHTER IN LATE ANTIQUITY......Page 229 LAUGHTER ON DISPLAY: MIMIC PERFORMANCES AND THE DANGER OF LAUGHING IN BYZANTIUM......Page 242 THE POWER OF AMUSEMENT AND THE AMUSEMENT OF POWER: THE PRINCELY FRESCOES OF ST SOPHIA, KIEV, AND THEIR CONNECTIONS TO THE BYZANTINE WORLD......Page 253 LAUGHING AT EROS AND APHRODITE: SEXUAL INVERSION AND ITS RESOLUTION IN THE CLASSICISING ARTS OF MEDIEVAL BYZANTIUM......Page 273 COMFORTING TEARS AND SUGGESTIVE SMILES: TO LAUGH AND CRY IN THE KOMNENIAN NOVEL......Page 299 DO BROTHERS WEEP? MALE GRIEF, MOURNING, LAMENT AND TEARS IN ELEVENTH- AND TWELFTH-CENTURY BYZANTIUM......Page 320 LAMENTS BY NICETAS CHONIATES AND OTHERS FOR THE FALL OF CONSTANTINOPLE IN 1204......Page 346 ‘WORDS FILLED WITH TEARS’: AMOROUS DISCOURSE AS LAMENTATION IN THE PALAIOLOGAN ROMANCES......Page 361 THE TRAGIC, THE COMIC AND THE TRAGICOMIC IN CRETAN RENAISSANCE LITERATURE......Page 383 BELISARIUS IN THE SHADOW THEATRE: THE PRIVATE CALVARY OF A LEGENDARY GENERAL......Page 398 AFTERWORD......Page 411 APPENDIX: CHYROGLES, OR THE GIRL WITH TWO HUSBANDS......Page 421 BIBLIOGRAPHY......Page 428 INDEX LOCORUM......Page 480 INDEX RERUM......Page 490