Table Of Content

Brill’s Companion to Statius Brill’s Companions in Classical Studies The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/bccs Brill’s Companion to Statius Edited by W. J. Dominik, C. E. Newlands, and K. Gervais LEIDEN | BOSTON Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Brill’s companion to Statius / edited by W. J. Dominik, C. E. Newlands, and K. Gervais. pages cm — (Brill’s companions in classical studies) ISBN 978-90-04-21789-8 (hardback : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-90-04-28470-8 (e-book) 1. Statius, P. Papinius (Publius Papinius)—Criticism and interpretation. I. Dominik, William J. II. Newlands, Carole Elizabeth. III. Gervais, Kyle. IV. Series: Brill’s companions in classical studies. PA6698.B75 2015 871’.01—dc23 2014046302 This publication has been typeset in the multilingual ‘Brill’ typeface. With over 5,100 characters covering Latin, ipa, Greek, and Cyrillic, this typeface is especially suitable for use in the humanities. For more information, please see www.brill.com/brill-typeface. issn 1872-3357 isbn 978-90-04-21789-8 (hardback) isbn 978-90-04-28470-8 (e-book) Copyright 2015 by Koninklijke Brill nv, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Hes & De Graaf, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Rodopi and Hotei Publishing. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill nv provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, ma 01923, usa. Fees are subject to change. This book is printed on acid-free paper. Contents Preface ix Texts and Abbreviations xi Notes on Contributors xiii part 1 Introduction 1 Reading Statius 3 Carole E. Newlands, Kyle Gervais, and William J. Dominik part 2 Beginnings 2 Statius on Invocation and Inspiration 31 K. Sara Myers 3 The Silvae: Poetics of Impromptu and Cultural Consumption 54 Gianpiero Rosati 4 The Beginnings of the Achilleid 73 Randall T. Ganiban part 3 Social and Cultural Matters 5 Creating the Distinguished Addressee: Literary Patronage in the Works of Statius 91 Meike Rühl 6 Gift and Society in the Works of Statius 106 Neil Coffee vi contents 7 Negative Stereotypes of Wealth in the Works of Statius 123 Bruce Gibson 8 Family and Kinship in the Works of Statius 139 Neil W. Bernstein part 4 Transgressive Poetics: The Achilleid 9 Statius’ Achilleid: The Paradoxical Epic 157 Peter J. Davis 10 Intertext, Metapoetry, and Visuality in the Achilleid 173 Christopher Chinn 11 Similes and Gender in the Achilleid 189 Charles McNelis part 5 Conflict, Power, and Death in the Thebaid 12 “War Came in Disarray . . .” (Thebaid 7.616): Statius and the Depiction of Battle 207 Rhiannon Ash 13 Parent-Child Conflict in the Thebaid 221 Kyle Gervais 14 Transgressing Boundaries of the Unthinkable: Sophocles, Ovid, Vergil, Seneca, and Homer Refracted in Statius’ Thebaid 240 Frederick Ahl 15 Similes and Their Programmatic Role in the Thebaid 266 William J. Dominik contents vii 16 The Constitutional Status of Euripidean and Statian Theseus: Some Aspects of the Criticism of Absolute Power in the Thebaid 291 Cecilia Criado 17 Dead Woman Walking: Jocasta in the Thebaid 307 Jessica S. Dietrich part 6 Predecessors and Contemporaries 18 Statius’ Epic Poetry: A Challenge to the Literary Past 325 Laura Micozzi 19 Statius’ Thebaid and Greek Tragedy: The Legacy of Thebes 343 Agis Marinis 20 Georgics 2.497 and Thebaid 1.19–20: Allusion and Inspiration 362 Victoria E. Pagán 21 Statius and Senecan Drama 377 Antony Augoustakis 22 Lucan’s De Bello Civili in the Thebaid 393 Paul Roche 23 Following after Valerius: Argonautic Imagery in the Thebaid 408 Helen Lovatt 24 Statius and Silius Italicus 425 François Ripoll 25 Statius and Martial: Post-vatic Self-fashioning in Flavian Rome 444 Luke Roman viii contents part 7 Reception 26 Reading Statius Through a Biographical Lens 465 Ruth Parkes 27 Papinius Noster: Statius in Roman Late Antiquity 481 Helen Kaufmann 28 Medieval Statius: Belatedness and Authority 497 Robert R. Edwards 29 Statius in Dante’s Commedia 512 Peter Heslin 30 The Thebaid in Italian Renaissance Epic: The Case of Capaneus 527 Pramit Chaudhuri 31 Early Modern Thebaid: The Latin Commentary Tradition 543 Valéry Berlincourt 32 Statian Recusatio: Angelo Poliziano and John Dryden 562 Dustin Mengelkoch 33 Naturalizing Statius 579 Susanna Braund 34 Statius in an Ideological Climate 600 Carole E. Newlands Bibliography 613 Index Locorum 674 General Index 688 Preface Statius (c. 45–96 ce) is a key figure in the history of Latin literature. Janus-like, his poetry draws upon the rich legacy of Augustan and Hellenistic poetry as well as Neronian; it also looks forward to the shaping of new aesthetic princi- ples and genres in late antique and medieval literature. Since Statius, after lan- guishing in neglect for several centuries, has in the past forty years finally again aroused serious critical interest and literary appreciation, it seemed timely to accept Brill’s invitation to produce the Brill’s Companion to Statius; we, the editors, are grateful to Brill for taking this initiative. Statius wrote at an important juncture in imperial history—in the last years of the reign of Domitian (81–96 ce) and of the Flavian dynasty (70–96 ce)—when hopes for a return to the republic were definitively crushed and Rome was being fashioned into a cosmopolitan, imperial power on an unprec- edented scale with buildings of immense grandeur such as the Colosseum; after Augustus, Domitian was the most prolific builder of the city of Rome. Inevitably the writings of Tacitus and Suetonius on Domitian’s “reign of terror” in the 90s have colored perceptions of Statius’ poetry, while the flourishing of the arts and literature under Domitian—with the three major epic poets Valerius Flaccus, Silius Flaccus, and Statius and the epigrammatist Martial— have been relatively overlooked. Our major objectives in planning this volume have been to represent a broad range of critical perspectives on Statius’ poetry and to offer a histori- cal perspective on the vagaries of his reception from late antiquity onwards. We have sought to offer these varied perspectives partly by including scholars from institutions in a number of countries with different scholarly tradi- tions, namely usa, England, Wales, Canada, Australia, France, Switzerland, Germany, Italy, Spain, and Greece. While our aim has been to avoid the polari- ties involving Statius’ style and politics that have circulated around his poetry, we have endeavoured at the same time to encourage discussion and debate among the contributors to this volume (as reflected in the numerous cross- references), which necessarily entails critical agreement and disagreement with each other and other scholars. Many contributors had the opportu- nity to share their chapters and receive feedback at the Statius International Conference organized by Cecilia Criado and William J. Dominik and held at the University of Santiago de Compostela, Spain in June 2013. The editors express their appreciation to the University of Santiago de Compostela and Brill for sponsoring this Conference, which included Statian scholars not only from the countries mentioned above but also from Portugal and Mexico. x preface By studying the poetry of Statius from a variety of vantage points, Brill’s Companion to Statius aims to offer a full and complex picture of this poet’s critical role in Roman literary history and imperial culture. The Companion offers detailed approaches to all three of Statius’ major works—the Thebaid, Achilleid, and Silvae. It thus serves both as an introduction to Statius’ poetry and as a stimulus to further research; it is intended to appeal to a varied read- ership of students and scholars in the Humanities. It is our hope that Brill’s Companion to Statius not only will illuminate the importance of Statius’ poetry for literary, social, and political studies but also that it will confirm his standing as a powerful and innovative figure in Latin literature. We express our warm gratitude to a number of people and institutions for their help in the production of this volume. To all our contributors we offer our sincere thanks for their patience, good humor, and care during its long production; in particular, we are grateful to Robert Edwards for bringing the illustration used on the cover to our attention. We express our thanks to James Holland (Texas Tech University), who offered comments on various chapters; Andrew Zissos (University of California, Irvine), who read and commented upon a draft of the introductory chapter; and to Agis Marinis (University of Patras / Hellenic Open University), who helped with the proofreading. We are indebted to Gordon Turner (University of Otago) for his editorial work and to Tim Wright (University of Western Ontario) for his substantial assistance in compiling the indices. In addition, we are extremely grateful not only to the staff at Brill—namely Tessel Jonquière, Jennifer Pavelko, Caroline van Erp, and Irene van Rossum—but also to Dinah Rapliza, who handled the production process of this book on behalf of Brill, for their impeccable professionalism and unflagging patience. Finally, we express our appreciation to the University of Otago, its Division of Humanities, and the Faculty of Arts at the University of Western Ontario for the award of grants that assisted us in the completion of this book. William J. Dominik Dunedin, New Zealand Carole Newlands Boulder, usa Kyle Gervais London, Canada February 2015