Papers by Katherine L Kretler
In Nature and Culture in the Iliad: The Tragedy of Hector , James Redfield shows how the Iliad 's... more In Nature and Culture in the Iliad: The Tragedy of Hector , James Redfield shows how the Iliad 's tragic qualities are bound up with cultural contradictions. He thus illuminates many murky areas of Aristotle's Poetics by the light of Homer and develops a philosophical anthropology of the Homeric heroes. In this essay I return to the way the Poetics and the Iliad cast light on one another, with special attention to Aristotle's insistence on "one complete action" and his account of the genesis of drama. I argue that, for Aristotle, the light shed by drama on action goes beyond what is conveyed by its plot. Aristotle sees in Homer a dramatic thought-action that culminates in moments where the performer appears to reach into the sources of his ongoing performance and to be enlivened by them. These "enlivening" moments are related to Aristotle's "one complete action," a certain kind of plot. Aspects of performance are harder to describe than plot, but they can, to a limited extent, be imitated, even in prose: and this is what Aristotle has done. Aristotle does not only admire Homer's "one action" on the level of plot. For Aristotle, Homer discloses or taps the roots of action in a way that shows he understands what action is. Aristotle's imitation of the dramatic thought-action found in Homer, and particularly in Homeric ring composition, conveys in prose a moment of culmination associated with performance, a kind of "possession" or reaching back to past generations that enlivens the ongoing performance. First, then, I show how an appreciation of Homeric ring composition is reflected in Aristotle's Poetics , in his account of the birth of tragedy; here I summarise and make explicit what is left implicit in another study (Kretler 2018). I then indicate parallels to Aristotle's account elsewhere in Greek poetry. These make plausible the schema I bring out in Aristotle but also further clarify its shape and internal workings. Aristotle draws on a general poetic pattern but is fueled mainly by Homeric technique. I offer these reflections in gratitude to James Redfield, whose teaching and writing stimulate so many to return to the well of ancient Greek poetic thinking. One whole complete action: the shape of the Iliad and a pivotal speech Aristotle insists that tragedy is a mimesis of praxis (action) that is one, whole and complete, having a beginning, middle and end (Poetics 1459a19; cf. Tapping the wellsprings of action Aristotle's birth of tragedy as a mimesis of poetic praxis Katherine Kretler * Diagram 5.1 Calendar of the Iliad.
Routledge eBooks, Jul 27, 2018
Classical World, 2020
Shannon-Henderson's work allows the modern reader to read the Annales with an increased idea of w... more Shannon-Henderson's work allows the modern reader to read the Annales with an increased idea of what is at stake with every omission, alteration, and perversion of the state cult by the principate. Thus, the modern reader of Tacitus is made aware of another subtle register with which to understand the corrupting and destructive effects of the Julio-Claudian principate. This volume is a meticulous study of cultic memory, and its subversion, in the Annales, and will be of great importance not only to students and scholars of Tacitus but also to those with interests in the interplay between historiography, the early empire, and religion.
Thinking the Greeks: A Volume in Honour of James M. Redfield, 2019
This essay offers an interpretation of Aristotle’s account of the birth of tragedy (Poetics 1448b... more This essay offers an interpretation of Aristotle’s account of the birth of tragedy (Poetics 1448b18–1449a15) as a mimesis of poetic praxis. The workings of this passage emerge when read in connection with ring composition in Homeric speeches, and further unfold through a comparison with the Shield of Achilles and with an ode from Euripides’ Heracles.
Aristotle appears to draw upon a traditional pattern enacting cyclical rebirth or revitalization. It is suggested that his puzzling insistence on “one complete action” in plot is bound up with moment-to-moment performance. The poetics of Aristotle’s account suggest a pedagogy of mimesis.
Books by Katherine L Kretler
One Man Show: Poetics and Presence in the Iliad and Odyssey, 2020
(blurb)
This book plumbs the virtues of the Homeric poems as scripts for solo performance. Despit... more (blurb)
This book plumbs the virtues of the Homeric poems as scripts for solo performance. Despite academic focus on orality and on composition in performance, we have yet to fully appreciate the Iliad and Odyssey as the sophisticated scripts that they are. What is lost in the journey from the stage to the page?
Readers may be readily impressed by the vividness of the poems, but they may miss out on the strange presence or uncanniness that the performer evoked in ancient audience members such as Plato and Aristotle. This book focuses on the performer not simply as transparent mediator, but as one haunted by multiple stories and presences, who brings suppressed voices to the surface.
Performance is inextricable from all aspects of the poems, from image to structure to background story. Background stories previously neglected, even in some of the most familiar passages (such as Phoenix’s speech in Iliad 9) are brought to the surface, and passages readers tend to rush through (such as Odysseus’s encounter with Eumaeus) are shown to have some of the richest dramatic potential. Attending to performance enlivens isolated features in a given passage by showing how they work together.
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Papers by Katherine L Kretler
Aristotle appears to draw upon a traditional pattern enacting cyclical rebirth or revitalization. It is suggested that his puzzling insistence on “one complete action” in plot is bound up with moment-to-moment performance. The poetics of Aristotle’s account suggest a pedagogy of mimesis.
Books by Katherine L Kretler
This book plumbs the virtues of the Homeric poems as scripts for solo performance. Despite academic focus on orality and on composition in performance, we have yet to fully appreciate the Iliad and Odyssey as the sophisticated scripts that they are. What is lost in the journey from the stage to the page?
Readers may be readily impressed by the vividness of the poems, but they may miss out on the strange presence or uncanniness that the performer evoked in ancient audience members such as Plato and Aristotle. This book focuses on the performer not simply as transparent mediator, but as one haunted by multiple stories and presences, who brings suppressed voices to the surface.
Performance is inextricable from all aspects of the poems, from image to structure to background story. Background stories previously neglected, even in some of the most familiar passages (such as Phoenix’s speech in Iliad 9) are brought to the surface, and passages readers tend to rush through (such as Odysseus’s encounter with Eumaeus) are shown to have some of the richest dramatic potential. Attending to performance enlivens isolated features in a given passage by showing how they work together.
Aristotle appears to draw upon a traditional pattern enacting cyclical rebirth or revitalization. It is suggested that his puzzling insistence on “one complete action” in plot is bound up with moment-to-moment performance. The poetics of Aristotle’s account suggest a pedagogy of mimesis.
This book plumbs the virtues of the Homeric poems as scripts for solo performance. Despite academic focus on orality and on composition in performance, we have yet to fully appreciate the Iliad and Odyssey as the sophisticated scripts that they are. What is lost in the journey from the stage to the page?
Readers may be readily impressed by the vividness of the poems, but they may miss out on the strange presence or uncanniness that the performer evoked in ancient audience members such as Plato and Aristotle. This book focuses on the performer not simply as transparent mediator, but as one haunted by multiple stories and presences, who brings suppressed voices to the surface.
Performance is inextricable from all aspects of the poems, from image to structure to background story. Background stories previously neglected, even in some of the most familiar passages (such as Phoenix’s speech in Iliad 9) are brought to the surface, and passages readers tend to rush through (such as Odysseus’s encounter with Eumaeus) are shown to have some of the richest dramatic potential. Attending to performance enlivens isolated features in a given passage by showing how they work together.