Classical Literature and Posthumanism

Description

The subject of the posthuman, of what it means to be or to cease to be human, is emerging as a shared point of debate at large in the natural and social sciences and the humanities. This volume asks what classical learning can bring to the table of posthuman studies, assembling chapters that explore how exactly the human self of Greek and Latin literature understands its own relation to animals, monsters, objects, cyborgs and robotic devices. With its widely diverse habitat of heterogeneous bodies, minds, and selves, classical literature again and again blurs the boundaries between the human and the non-human; not to equate and confound the human with its other, but playfully to highlight difference and hybridity, as an invitation to appraise the animal, monstrous or mechanical/machinic parts lodged within humans. This comprehensive collection unites contributors from across the globe, each delving into a different classical text or narrative and its configuration of human subjectivity-how human selves relate to other entities around them. For students and scholars of classical literature and the posthuman, this book is a first point of reference. Cover page Halftitle page Series page Title page Copyright page Dedication CONTENTS CONTRIBUTORS THEORETICAL INTRODUCTION: THE SUBJECT OF THE HUMAN Section 1: Humanism and Post/humanism Section 2: The heterogeneous self Section 3: Becoming- animal Section 4: Becoming- machine Section 5: Disentangling technophobia Section 6: Informatics of domination Section 7: Post/humanism and anarchy INTRODUCTIONS TO POST/HUMAN THEORIES THE QUESTION OF THE ANIMAL AND THE ARISTOTELIAN HUMAN HORSE FOUCAULT, THE MONSTROUS AND MONSTROSITY HOW TO BECOME A CYBORG1 Cyborg: A short biography Polymorphic information systems Networks and nodes Embodied knowledge: Material-semiotic actors ANDERS, SIMONDON AND THE BECOMING OF THE POSTHUMAN Posthuman as pharmakon Promethean shame and the obsolescence of man Double alienation and the becoming of the technical individual Against naïve posthuman ontologies PART I DE/HUMANIZATION AND ANIMALS CHAPTER 1 ODYSSEUS, THE BOAR AND THE ANTHROPOGENIC MACHINE1 I. Audience expectations and the analogical worldview II. The anthropogenic machine at work III. Cross-species entanglements CHAPTER 2 WHAT IS IT LIKE TO BE A DONKEY (WITH A HUMAN MIND)? PSEUDO-LUCIAN’S ONOS Becoming a donkey Lucius’ relationship with human and non-human animals Suffering animals A donkey’s life with a human mind Concluding words CHAPTER 3 QUAM SOLI VIDISTIS EQUI: FOCALIZATION AND ANIMAL SUBJECTIVITY IN VALERIUS FLACCUS Introduction The Promethean vulture The cavalry of Ariasmenus Conclusion CHAPTER 4 ANIMALITY, ILLNESS AND DEHUMANIZATION: THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF ILLNESS IN SOPHOCLES’ PHILOCTETES1 Illness as hyper-awareness of one’s corporeal reality Identity loss: Becoming animal Identity loss: From civilized man to ‘primitive’ Identity loss: The house-keeper, the baby and the slave Ultimate identity loss: Bodily annihilation Conclusion CHAPTER 5 THE IMPERIAL ANIMAL: VIRGIL’S GEORGICS AND THE ANTHROPO-/THERIOMORPHIC ENTERPRISE1 Domestication station Domestication nation Conquest and quarantine CHAPTER 6 ANIMALS, GOVERNANCE AND WARFARE IN THE ILIAD AND AESCHYLUS’ PERSIANS A sheepish subject The Shepherd of the people: The leader and his flock Martial herding Prey-predators Gender: The bull and the cattle Aeschylus’ Persians : The shattered flock Conclusion CHAPTER 7 THE SOVEREIGN AND THE BEAST: IMAGES OF ANCIENT TYRANNY PART II THE MONSTROUS CHAPTER 8 TYPHOEUS OR COSMIC REGRESSION (THEOGONY 821–880) CHAPTER 9 DEMONIC DISEASE IN GREEK TRAGEDY: ILLNESS, ANIMALITY AND DEHUMANIZATION Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound Sophocles, Trachiniae and Philoctetes Euripides, Hippolytus and Orestes Conclusions: The νόσοςas ἀμορφία CHAPTER 10 THE SPHINX AND ANOTHER THINKING OF LIFE CHAPTER 11 WHEN ROME’S ELEPHANTS WEEP: HUMANE MONSTERS FROM POMPEY’S THEATRE TO VIRGIL’S TROJAN HORSE Elephants’ human community Elephants as the symbol of imperial power Elephants, the Trojan Horse, and the origins of Latin literature CHAPTER 12 THE MONSTROSITY OF CATO IN LUCAN’S CIVIL WAR 9 Introduction Fracturing of the subject Affinities and alienation Virtus after the vir Conclusions CHAPTER 13 WHY CAN’T I HAVE WINGS? ARISTOPHANES’ BIRDS Introduction Avian technology Wings as demerit goods Ornithomania PART III BODIES AND ENTANGLEMENTS CHAPTER 14 THE SEER’S TWO BODIES: SOME EARLY GREEK HISTORIES OF TECHNOLOGY CHAPTER 15 FLUID CYPRESS AND HYBRID BODIES AS A COGNITIVELY DISTURBING METAPHOR IN EURIPIDES’ CRETANS The temple and the cypress Fluid cypress No ordinary metaphor The body and the temple CHAPTER 16 BODY POLITICS IN THE ANTIQUITATES ROMANAE OF DIONYSIUS OF HALICARNASSUS Introduction The distinctiveness of the Antiquitates Romanae The Fable of the Belly and the Body’s Members Menenius Agrippa before the senate Menenius Agrippa before the seceders CHAPTER 17 THE MYTH OF IO AND FEMALE CYBORGIC IDENTITY The girl-heifer in Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound and Suppliant Maidens Conclusions CHAPTER 18 COSMIC, ANIMAL AND HUMAN BECOMINGS: A CASE STUDY IN ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY Harmonic compounds: Philolaus’ becomings Philolaus’ cosmic, animal and human becomings CHAPTER 19 POSTHUMANISM IN SENECA’S HAPPY LIFE: ‘ANIMALISM’, PERSONIFICATION AND PRIVATE PROPERTY IN ROMAN STOICISM ( EPISTULAE MORALES 113 AND DE VITA BEATA 5–8) Introduction: The two cyborgs of Roman Stoicism Four arguments from Ep. 113 Four arguments and three tropes in The Happy Life How the virtues became posthuman: The ei-cuius clause of Ep. 113 Conclusion: The part of play in Roman philosophy CHAPTER 20 HAGIOGRAPHY WITHOUT HUMANS: SIMEON THE STYLITE Becoming-plant (Theodoret, RH 26.5) Becoming- mountain, becoming-insect (Theodoret, RH 26.10) Becoming-icon (Theodoret, RH 26.11) Becoming-column (Theodoret, RH 26.12) Becoming-human (Theodoret, RH 26.1, 23, 28) Becoming-worm (Antonius, LS 5–8, 17–18) Becoming flesh: Concluding reflections PART IV OBJECTS, MACHINES AND ROBOTIC DEVICES CHAPTER 21 ASSEMBLAGES AND OBJECTS IN GREEK TRAGEDY Ruinous materials in Aeschylus’ Oresteia Material assemblages in Euripides’ Andromache Bodystuff in Sophocles’ Trachiniae CHAPTER 22 HYBRIS AND HYBRIDITY IN AESCHYLUS’ PERSIANS: A POSTHUMANIST PERSPECTIVE ON XERXES’ EXPEDITION The bridging of the Hellespont and supra-humanity Infra-humanity at Salamis Epilogue CHAPTER 23 MALFUNCTIONS OF EMBODIMENT: MAN/WEAPON AGENCY AND THE GREEK IDEOLOGY OF MASCULINITY CHAPTER 24 AENEID 12: A CYBORG BORDER WAR Arma uirumque Wounding Virgil’s ideological chimera CHAPTER 25 THE PRESENCE OF PRESENTS: SPEAKING OBJECTS IN MARTIAL’S XENIA AND APOPHORETA Earlier voices Who gets to speak and why Entangled voices Conclusion CHAPTER 26 AUTOMATOPOETAE MACHINAE: LAWS OF NATURE AND HUMAN INVENTION (VITRUVIUS 9.8.4–7) CHAPTER 27 PANDORA AND ROBOTIC TECHNOLOGY TODAY Pandora as a fusion of the organic and the technical Pandora as a hybrid of machine and organism Pandora and robotic technology today Conclusions CHAPTER 28 ART, LIFE AND THE CREATION OF AUTOMATA: ON PINDAR, OLYMPIAN 7.50–53 ‘Like living and moving beings’ Sane mentality and the straight road CHAPTER 29 STAYING ALIVE: PLATO, HORACE AND THE WRITTEN TEXT Introduction Plato and the immortality of Socrates Horace and the intertextual continuum Conclusion CHAPTER 30 BEYOND THE BEAUTIFUL EVIL? THE ANCIENT/FUTURE HISTORY OF SEX ROBOTS CONCLUSIONS I II III NOTES BIBLIOGRAPHY INDEX