Egypt, Ethiopia, and the Greek Novel - Between Representation and Resistance

In this richly detailed study, Robert Cioffi explores the signficance of the Nile River Valley as the geographic centre of the ancient Greek novel during the genre's heyday in the Roman empire. He shows how the region is repeatedly portrayed in these fictions as a dual-site of ethnographic representation and of resistance to imperial power.

List of contents

• List of Figures


• Note on titles, transliterations, and translations


• Abbreviations


• Maps


• Introduction: In the Month of Hathor


• 1: Religion, Revolt, and Rome in Chariton, Xenophon of Ephesus, and Apuleius


• 2: Where the Wild Things Are: Achilles Tatius and Egyptian Animals


• 3: The Lives of Others: The Boukoloi, the Nile Delta, and the Frontiers of Knowledge in Achilles Tatius


• 4: Alexandria and Apocalypse: Representation, Resistance, and Time


• 5: An Ethiopian Story in Egypt


• 6: The Ends of Ethiopia in Heliodorus' An Ethiopian Story


• Epilogue. Egypt, Ethiopia, and the Americas: The Greek Novels' Early Modern Readers


• Bibliography


• Index

About the author

Robert Cioffi is Assistant Professor of Classics at Bard College. His research centres on Greek literature, the history of the novel, Greek and Egyptian cultural interactions, and papyrology. He received a BA and PhD from Harvard University, and an MSt from the University of Oxford. In addition to his scholarly publications, he is a contributor to the London Review of Books and has written for the New York Times Book Review.

Summary

In this richly detailed study, Robert Cioffi explores the signficance of the Nile River Valley as the geographic centre of the ancient Greek novel during the genre's heyday in the Roman empire. He shows how the region is repeatedly portrayed in these fictions as a dual-site of ethnographic representation and of resistance to imperial power.

Product details

• Authors: Robert Cioffi, Robert (Assistant Professor of Classics Cioffi
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 05.01.2024
• EAN: 9780192870537
• ISBN: 978-0-19-287053-7
• No. of pages: 304
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > Classical linguistics / literary studies; HISTORY / Ancient / Egypt, LITERARY CRITICISM / Ancient & Classical, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Archaeology, Literary studies: classical, early & medieval, Ancient History, Archaeology by period / region, Ancient history: to c 500 CE, Literary studies: fiction, novelists & prose writers, Literary studies: fiction, novelists and prose writers, Literary studies: ancient, classical and medieval, Ancient Egypt, Egyptian Archaeology / Egyptology, LITERARY CRITICISM / Novel as Form