Imagining the Chorus in Augustan Poetry

Description

From archaic Sparta to classical Athens the chorus was a pervasive feature of Greek social and cultural life. Until now, however, its reception in Roman literature and culture has been little appreciated. This book examines how the chorus is reimagined in a brief but crucial period in the history of Latin literature, the early Augustan period from 30 to 10 BCE. It argues that in the work of Horace, Virgil, and Propertius, the language and imagery of the chorus articulate some of their most pressing concerns surrounding social and literary belonging in a rapidly changing Roman world. By re-examining seminal Roman texts such as Horace's Odes and Virgil's Aeneid from this fresh perspective, the book connects the history of musical culture with Augustan poetry's interrogation of fundamental questions surrounding the relationship between individual and community, poet and audience, performance and writing, Greek and Roman, and tradition and innovation. FM......Page 1 Dedication......Page 5 Contents......Page 7 Acknowledgements......Page 9 A Note on Ancient Texts and Translations......Page 11 Abbreviations......Page 12 Introduction - The Chorus in the Augustan Imagination......Page 17 Imagined Choruses from Alexandria to Rome......Page 48 Dance and Desire in Propertius’ Elegies......Page 87 Horace and the Erotics of the Lyric Chorus......Page 124 Canon, Community, and Chorus......Page 146 Virgil’s Aeneid and the Relocation of Ritual......Page 189 Foundational Choreography in the Aeneid......Page 215 Epilogue - ‘Now All the Earth Will Dance!’......Page 251 References......Page 255 Index Locorum......Page 276 General Index......Page 279