CHAPTER 21 The Magnetic Stone of Love

Greek Novel and Poetry

Françoise Létoublon

Greek novels have been investigated as a kind of concentrated intertextual genre, as a “symphony of texts” (Zimmermann 1997); however, their relation to Greek poetry was not analyzed as accurately as was their relation to other genres, such as epic or drama. Though an important article by Chalk (1960) dealt long ago and at large with this question, it centered on Longus. The commentaries on Longus also took into account the massive presence of poetry in the text of this novel, often called a Pastoral under the auspices of Theocritus (Hunter 1983; Morgan 2004; Pattoni 2005). While we can read some remarks on the question in several other publications, it may still be worth a specific investigation.

Though the term “intertextuality” has generally received approval (see Morgan and Harrison 2008), I would like to stress the interest in the terminology of “allusion,” due as far I know to the Italians Giorgio Pasquali and Gian Biagio Conte; this terminological choice refers to a less literate culture than the modern one (Alaux and Létoublon 1998; Zimmerman 1997). When we say further that the novelists were working “in the library” rather than in reality, it does not however imply that they were quoting books as we do in modern times, but that they allude to texts, be it the Iliad, Odyssey, Oresteia, or any other Greek poem or prose. They had those texts in mind, rather than books in hand.

The whole of Greek literature seems to meet in the Greek novels at different levels, less in the Ephesiaca than in the other four of the so-called “Big Five,” either because the Ephesiaca is a summary or because it is merely not as well composed and written than the other surviving texts. In Chariton, the heroes’ emotions in critical moments in particular call for several references to heroic death on the Homeric battlefield (Fusillo; Létoublon 2008a; Morgan and Harrison 2008). More generally, the novels’ heroes model themselves most often on the Iliad’s Achilles (Chaireas and Theagenes, see Morgan and Harrison 2008, 219–220), whereas the novel’s plot itself rather follows the Odyssean model (Morgan and Harrison 2008, 220). In a more parodic manner, in Achilles Tatius, we see Leucippe and Clitophon escaping the very tempest that almost killed Odysseus in the Odyssey with its “big wave” (mega kuma occurs as a formula for the tempests that Odysseus meets in the epics, and Tatius uses in his second tempest the superlative kuma megiston [5.9.1.4]). During the first tempest in the novel (3.5.1–5), the youths vow they could be swallowed together by the same whale with words that recall Patroclus’ vow in the Iliad that his ashes be later reunited with Achilles’ in the golden urn that Thetis once gave his son (see Létoublon 2008a, on “Λύτο γούνατα” and other typically Homeric formulas). In both episodes, the parody of the Odyssey appears.

Other poetical quotations may be found, with an apparently decorative function, such as Hesiod’s Works and Days 57–58, which is actually an attack against women:

In lieu of flame I have a gift for men:
an evil thing and still their heart’s delight,
so all men will embrace their own destruction.
(Leucippe and Clitophon 1.8.1; on this passage and the use of the Hesiodic allusion to the myth of Pandora, see Fusillo 1990, 43.)

In the context of Kleinias’ discourse for Clitophon, it is interesting that the next sentence in the novel comments on the quotation with a substitution of the Sirens instead of Pandora, in a kind of syncretism typical of mythological thought in this period of the Roman empire (on this phenomenon, see particularly Selden 1994). It will not be possible to treat in depth here the relation between poetry and myth (for myth in the novel, see Cueva 2004; for theater myths, see Létoublon and Genre in this collection): mythological themes often occur in the novels as short narrations in prose, as if they would summarize a longer tale—not a feminist one—maybe originally in verse: Leucippe and Clitophon 1.8.4:

ἀλλ’ εἰ μὲν ἰδιώτης σθα μουσικη̑ς, ἠγνόεις ἂν τὰ τω̑ν γυναικω̑ν δράματα· νῦν δὲ κἂν ἄλλοις λέγοις, ὅσων ἐνέπλησαν μύθων γυναι̑κες τὴν σκηνήν· < ὁ > ὅρμος ‘Εριφύλης, Φιλομήλας ἡ τράπεζα, Σθενεβοίας ἡ διαβολή, ‘Αερόπης ἡ κλοπή, Πρόκνης ἡ σφαγή. (If you were a stranger to culture, you would not know about the dramas involving women, but as it is you could tell others how many plots women have contributed to the stage: Eriphyle’s necklace, Philomela’s banquet, Stheneboia’s accusation, Aerope’s theft, Prokne’s slaughter.¹)

Since the ideal form of Greek novel consists in love stories, dealing entirely with a young couple’s adventure and the difficulties met before finding happiness, the genre could not use solely the epic tradition to express fittingly its main object. As Simon Goldhill (2008, 187) puts it, “Comedy calls forth laughter, the lyric sublime emotions, the novel the enchantment of narrative…. To resist such pleasures is to deny the genre.” Greek lyric and epigrammatic poetry more properly correspond to the various manners and ways of expressing love that the novel needed.² As Fusillo has shown, Eros is a “thematic paradigm” in the novel, and the novelists knew specifically from the Lyric poets how to express this paradigm, especially through a large range of metaphors (see Morales 2008, 41, on eros and sexuality).

As the title of this chapter suggests, the metaphor of the magnetic stone, borrowed in several of our novels most probably from tragedy and Plato,³ could account for the whole genre; as a symbol of love and attraction between the two lovers, it could also show how the literary genres attract each other and the ways in which the more recent of them borrow their lexical material from their predecessors.

Eros as Central Theme of the Inserted Tales and of Reflexivity

As we show elsewhere (Létoublon ANS, forthcoming), mythological tales function in the narrative as paradigms. Confer, for example, the meaning defined by Willcock for the Niobe tale in Iliad 24: in Daphnis and Chloe, the tales told by Daphnis concerning Phatta, Echo, the mimetic dance of both Daphnis and Chloe imitating Pan and Syrinx⁴ (which compare to the ordalic judgments in the end of Leucippe and Clitophon [first Leucippe with Syrinx, then Melite within the Styx cave]) show the characters what to do, to some extent. They constitute a kind of model for them. Indeed, myth is one of the polyphonic voices found in the novel (see especially Whitmarsh 2008; Goldhill 2008): in Achilles Tatius, the ordalic judgments are a test for the virginity of Leucippe and the faithfulness of Melite, and thus the mythical story of Syrinx and Styx acts as a way of showing the limit between the truth and what is false. In another passage quoted in the following text, the myth of Alpheus and Arethusa plays this role among other non-mythological models found in nature. One of Clitophon’s love counselors advises him that, since Apollo himself was in love and pursued Daphne, he does not have to behave in a wiser manner than the god (1.5.1).⁵

Other mythological episodes play on specular imagery: in Heliodorus, a painting showing Perseus and Andromeda, described on an embroidered tainia (band or stretch?) with a hieroglyphic inscription, calls for decipherment by the Egyptian priest Calasiris (see Winkler 1982, 1985, on Heliodorus’ and Apuleius’ novels as posing the “question of reading,” the ainigmata asking for the “interpretation of tales”). The painting will act as a proof of Charicleia’s identity in Book 10, and it will be used as such for this very special task.

Let us recall briefly that, in Achilles Tatius, a painting showing Europa’s rape opens the novel and creates the whole first-person narration; another painting shows the symmetrical images of Prometheus and Andromeda being delivered by Herakles and Perseus, respectively; a third painting brilliantly shows the bloody story of Tereus, Procne, and Philomela—the story was twice alluded to in the summary of Leucippe and Clitophon 1.8.4, quoted earlier: “Philomela’s table” and “Procne’s murder.” Those images all need explanations and have a strong link to the narrated events. In the prologue to Daphnis and Chloe, a painting is described as representing the same events as the narrative (found children nurtured by animals), which creates a kind of challenge (Greek antigrapsai)⁶; we also read how the old Philetas tells his young protégés how he saw in his garden a winged youth who appears to be Eros playing at his games.⁷

Though it is not directly related to poetry, it is also necessary to mention briefly that the novelists sometimes put a “philosophy” or at least a theory of love, based mainly on Plato, into their characters’ mouths: mostly in Achilles Tatius, the most rhetorical of the novels, where we find Clinias exposing the idea of the union at a distance (1.9.4) and the same Clinias theorizing on kissing (1.10.5); cf. also Clitophon 2.8.2. At 1.16–18, there occurs a long conversation between Clitophon and Satyros for Leucippe’s edification, meant as a seduction device. Of course, the pragmatic use of this kind of discourse by the characters is in itself deeply antithetic to the Socratic and Platonic definitions of philosophy as a quest of truth without a practical aim. That is probably precisely why Clitophon and his interlocutors make us smile. This device is perhaps a remembrance of Socrates put on the stage by Aristophanes in the Clouds and of the phrontisterion where his father wants Pheidippides to learn the use of arguments. Longus’ and Heliodorus’ novels may be more deeply impregnated with Platonic ideas, but they do not express it with such devices as Achilles Tatius does, and thus it is more difficult to quote a particular passage. We shall meet up with this question again later.

Eros in Generic Evolution, or the Novel as an Echo Chamber for Literature

It has often been suggested that the characters in the novels act as incarnated forms of the connections between the author and the audience. These characters exist in a time when the polis no longerunifies citizens together, as was the case in the classical period, and individuals have become more important than the state (Rohde 1876, 15–18). Love became thus the refuge and hope for individuals, and the authors found in Greek poetry a treasure chest of the strongest erotic feelings and expressions available for them to reuse in their erotic tales. We will concentrate on the metaphorical expressions, but it is still useful to begin with the most conventional image of love that is found in the genre: a winged child armed with a bow and arrows. This conventional character is the master of the events in the incipit of Chariton, Xenophon of Ephesus, and Achilles Tatius (there in the painting showing Zeus as a bull, driven by this little child); it appears in Daphnis and Chloe in the tale by Philetas already mentioned. Heliodorus seems to avoid this conventional image, so common in Greek poetry that textual references may be omitted. However, he still uses it indirectly, quoting the visual arts and putting this wording in Theagenes’ mouth: “Do you not know that painters give Love wings to symbolize the mercurial state of his victims?” (Aeth. 4.2.3). Greek art actually seems to have spread this image along with literature, not before the fifth century, if we follow Gantz’ analysis (Gantz 1993, Chapter 1). This image may express in a convention recognized by everybody the “disruptive force” of Eros in Greek representations, to use Helen Morales’ phrase (2008, 42).

Among the main poetical expressions of love, some metaphors of love have already been traced back from the novels to Sappho’s poetry (Chalk [1960] and Carson [1986]; see also the whole of Greene 1996, and especially Lanata 1996 for Sappho’s invention of an “amatory language”).⁸ The best-known piece of poetry by Sappho, thanks to [Longinus’] Peri Hypsous, is probably fr. 31 LP. The inventor of the notion of Sublime defined the paradoxes of love in Sappho’s poem better than I could:

οὐ θαυμάζεις ὡς ὑπὸ τὸ αὐτὸ τὴν ψυχὴν τὸ σω̑μα, τὰς ἀκοὰς τὴν γλω̑σσαν, τὰς ὄψεις τὴν χρόαν, πάνθ’ ὡς ἀλλότρια διοιχόμενα ἐπιζητει̑, καὶ καθ’ ὑπεναντιώσεις ἅμα ψύχεται καίεται, ἀλογιστει̑ ϕρονει̑; †ἢ γὰρ† ϕοβει̑ται †ἢ παρ’ ὀλίγον τέθνηκεν ἵνα μὴ ἕν τι περὶ αὐτὴν πάθος ϕαίνηται, παθω̑ν δὲ σύνοδος; πάντα μὲν τοιαυ̑τα γίνεται περὶ τοὺς ἐρω̑ντας, ἡ λη̑ψις δ’ ὡς ἔϕην τω̑ν ἄκρων καὶ ἡ εἰς ταὐτὸ συναίρεσις ἀπειργάσατο τὴν ἐξοχήν. (De Sublimitate 10.3.1). (Do you not admire the way in which she brings everything together—mind and body, hearing and tongue, eyes and skin? She seems to have lost them all, and to be looking for them as though they were external to her. She is cold and hot, mad and sane, frightened and near death, all by turns. The result is that we see in her not a single emotion, but a complex of emotions. Lovers experience all this; Sappho’s excellence, as I have said, lies in her adoption of the most striking details [translation from Russell and Winterbottom 1972, 472].)

All of the five Greek ideal novels show how the lovers feel at the same time both cold and hot, his or her skin changes its color, and he or she feels contradictory feelings and sensations that recall Sappho’s expressions. The Sapphic expression “fire running under the skin” (fr. 31.10—Laird 2008 quotes this poem by Sappho as echoed in Daphnis and Chloe 1.17.4; 1.18.1; cf. Hunter 1983, 73–76) may have particularly inspired one of most famous metaphors of Love as burning the lovers, which is found very frequently in Greek poetry and prose after Sappho (for instance, Anth. Gr. 5.1.3; 5.50.2; 5.57.2; 5.89.5; 5.124.4; 5.124.5; 16.251.6, etc.).

Another frequent and commonplace metaphor is that of Love as War, already transferred by the Lyric Lesbians from the epics (Rissman 1983), thereafter better known through Latin poets, and particularly in Propertius 2.7 and several poems by Ovid as militia amoris. However, the Hellenistic epigrammatic tradition attests that the Greek authors in the Roman Empire did not need Roman models for this poetic device.⁹ We have found four instances in Chariton (5.4.1.2, 6.2.7.1, 6.9.6.2, 8.1.4.4), four in Achilles Tatius (4.7.4.3, 4.7.5.2, 6.10.6.1, 8.17.9.4), and three in Heliodorus (1.30.7.2, 4.17.3.4, 7.24.2.2); the clearest examples might be Leucippe and Clitophon 4.7.3–4:

στρατιώτης δὲ ἐν χερσὶν ἔχων μάχην ο images δεν εἰ ζήσεται; τοσαῦται τω̑ν θανάτων εἰσὶν ὁδοί. […] ἐπὶ πόλεμον νυ̑ν ἐξελεύσομαι βουκόλων· ἔνδον μου τη̑ς ψυχη̑ς ἄλλος πόλεμος κάθηται. στρατιώτης με πορθει̑ τόξον ἔχων, βέλος ἔχων. νενίκημαι, πεπλήρωμαι βελω̑ν· κάλεσον, ἄνθρωπε, ταχὺ τὸν ἰώμενον· ἐπείγει τὸ τραυ̑μα. ἅψω πῦρ ἐπὶ τοὺς πολεμίους. (How can a soldier with a war on his hands have any idea of how long he will live? There are so many ways to die. […] I am about to battle against the Rangers, but another battle is being waged in my soul. The enemy within is besieging me with his bow, harassing me with arrows: I have lost the fight; I am bristling with his shafts. Call the doctor, sir, and quickly, my wounds demand immediate attention. [Note the coincidence in the passage of both themes of the soldier and the war as a continuous metaphor.])

Or, Aeth. 4.17.3:

ἔνοπλος κω̑μος τὴν οἴκησιν τη̑ς Χαρικλείας κατελάμβανεν, ἐστρατήγει δὲ Θεαγένης τὸν ἐρωτικὸν του̑τον πόλεμον εἰς λόχον ἀπὸ τη̑ς πομπη̑ς τοὺς ἐϕήβους συντάξας. (… an armed band of revelers stormed Charikleia’s house. The commander in this campaign of love was Theagenes, who had formed the young men of the procession into a squadron of soldiers.)

In both Daphnis and Chloe and Leucippe and Clitophon, we read parallel episodes where the youths take the occasion of a bee-sting or chirping cicada to kiss or touch the other as if it could help cure her or him (cf. Longus 1.25 and Leucippe and Clitophon 2.7). We have already suggested that both of those passages, as well as Longus 1.13, may come more or less straight from Hellenistic poetry, where can be found a series of Anacreontea referring to Eros stung by a bee, which was often imitated later in the French tradition by the poets of the “Pléiade” (Létoublon 1993, 154–155). Let us quote Anacreontea 35.1–9 and 10–18 in J.M. Edmonds’ translation (Cambridge, MA. 1961):

Once on a day, rose-leaves among,
Young Love did fail to see
A sleeping bee,
And in the hand was stung.
He shrieked, and running both and flying
Sped to fair Venus’ side
And “Mother” cried,

“Out, out, alas! I’m dying.
A little snake that goes with wings
And as a bee is known
‘to th’ simple clown,
Hath bit me.” ‘If such things,
His mother answered, “make you woe,
What then do you suppose
Can be the woes
Of them you harry so?”

In the novels, those devices for finding ways to touch one another may be called ritual idioms of the Lovers (Létoublon 1993, 154–155). Of course, Daphnis is much more innocent and spontaneous in searching for the cicada in Chloe’s breast than Clitophon using the bee that stung Clio as a device for receiving a kiss from Leucippe on his mouth, while she sings a magic formula. However, the same poetical source may be suspected, and in both cases the kiss receives a metaphorical interpretation as the occasion for love pouring through the mouth to the heart.

Still another frequent metaphor of love is that of “athletics and competition,” which was known from Hellenistic times. It actually came from Homer and the athletic games evoked in both the Iliad and Odyssey. Pindar and Simonides, while singing the athletic victories in PanHellenic games, highlighted the metaphoric potentialities of competition, since the poets themselves enter in their Odes in competition with the athletes they are supposed to sing about—and they were well paid for it, in a kind of “traffic of praise,” as Kurke (1991; cf. Létoublon 2007) called it. In Hellenistic poetry, the athletic metaphor turned to symbolize love, particularly in the several poems in Anthology about Herakles: for all its images θλα, the hero underwent defeat in his fight against Love.

Λύσιππος, χαλκῳ̑ τ᾽ ἐγκατέμιξ᾽ ὀδύνην;
ἄχθῃ γυμνωθεὶς ὅπλων σέο: τίς δὲ σ᾽ ἔπερσεν;
‘ὁ πτερόεις, ὄντως ε images ς βαρὺς images θλος, Ἔρως.’ (AP 16.103.4–6)
(Why did Lysippus mould thus with disjected visage and allow the bronze with pain? Thou art in distress, stripped of thy arms. Who was it that laid thee low? Winged Love, of a truth one of thy heavy labours [by Geminus, translated by Paton].)
ὅπλων γυμνὸν ἰδει̑ν τòν θρασὺν ̔Ηρακλέα.
Πάντα σ ̓ Ἔρως ἀπέδυσε. (Philippus, AP 16.104.5–6)
(Love has stripped thee of all, and it is not strange that, having made Zeus a swan, he deprived Heracles of his weapons [translated by W.R. Paton, note the parallel between γυμνωθεὶς ὅπλων and ὅπλων γυμνὸν, translated as stripped in both cases].)

This metaphor is met in its purest condensed form in Achilles Tatius, where Clitophon says to Satyros: δέδοικα μὴ ἄτολμος ὤν καὶ δειλὸς ἔρωτος ἀθλητὴς γένωμαι (“but I still have lingering doubts that, as Love’s athlete, my nerve may fail, and I will falter in the contest,” Leucippe and Clitophon 2.4.4).

Two of our novels may have developed this metaphor on a large scale, so that they do not need to mention it in its conventional condensed form. It is quite evident in Chariton, where it is used in the opening of the novel: Chaireas is a young hero, much appreciated in the exercises of the gymnasion and palaistra. He meets Callirhoe in a public festival and procession, immediately falls in love (though he formerly swore he never would), feels it as a wound (trauma), and several images show his sport companions and the gymnasion itself as deserted and in sorrow (1.1.5, 1.1.15) (Létoublon 2007, 332). Thus, the athletic competition appears as an image that enlightens the beginning of the erotic tale.

The metaphor is much more complicatedly developed in Heliodorus because of the composition of the narrative and its well-known beginning in medias res. The athletic competition does not occur in the opening of the novel, but it still opens the beginning of the youth’s love for Charicleia: as Calasiris tells Cnemon in Book III, Theagenes met Charicleia during the Pythia in Delphi, where she was acting as Artemis’ priestess. Theagenes wins the running competition against Ormenos, since he wanted to receive the price from Charicleia’s hands. We see the opening of the metaphor in the end of Book 4, 4.1.1:

Τῃ̑ δὲ ὑστεραίᾳ ὁ μὲν Πυθίων ἀγὼν ἔληγεν ὁ δὲ τω̑ν νέων ἐπήκμαζεν ἀγωνοθετου̑ντος, ο images μαι, καὶ βραβεύοντος Ἔρωτος καὶ δι᾿ ἀθλητω̑ν δύο τούτων καὶ μόνων οὓς ἐζεύξατο μέγιστον ἀγώνων τὸν ἴδιον ἀποφη̑ναι φιλονεικήσαντος. Γίνεται γάρ τι τοιου̑τον · ἐθεώρει μὲν ἡ Ἑλλὰς ἠθλοθέτουν δὲ οἱ Ἀμφικτύονες. (The following day was the last of the Pythian tournament, but for the young couple another tournament was still at its height, one presided over and refereed, it seems to me, by Love, who was determined to use these two contestants, in the only match he has arranged, to prove that his particular tournament is the greatest of all.)

And, we find it blooming as the love tale goes on in Book 4 in Theagenes’ words: 4.2.3:

<<Καὶ τίς οὕτως> > ε images πεν < <ἰδει̑ν καὶ πλησιάσαι Χαρικλείᾳ μανικω̑ς ἐσπούδακεν ὥστ᾿ ἐμὲ παραδραμει̑ν; Τίνα δὲ οὕτως ἡ ὄψις ἐκείνης τάχα καὶ πτερω̑σαι δύναται καὶ μετάρσιον ἐπισπάσασθαι; Οὐκ ο images σθα ὅτι καὶ τὸν Ἔρωτα πτερου̑σιν οἱ γράφοντες, τὸ εὐκίνητον τω̑ν ὑπ᾿ αὐτου̑ κεκρατημένων αἰνιττόμενοι; Εἰ δὲ δει̑ τι καὶ κόμπου προσει̑ναι τοι̑c εἰρημένοις, οὐδεὶς ἐς τὴν σήμερον ποσί με παρελθὼν ἐσεμνύνατο.> > (Who is so insanely eager to see and be near Charikleia that he could outrun me? Is there anyone else to whom the mere sight of her can give wings and draw him to her without his touching the ground? Do you know that painters… [see above on the image of winged Love])

We will have to look again at the following description of Charikleia, who is also seen by Calasiris as an athlete, though she does not actually run like he does (4.3.3):

ἐνταυ̑θα οὔτε ἀτρεμεῖν ἔτι κατεῖχεν ἡ κόρη ἀλλ᾿ ἐσφάδαζεν ἡ βάσις καὶ οἱ πόδες ἔσκαιρον ὥσπερ, ο images μαι, τη̑ς ψυχη̑ς τῳ̑ Θεαγένει συνεξαιρομένης καὶ τὸν δρόμον συμπροθυμουμένης. (Now the maiden could stay still no longer: her feet began to skip and dance, as if, in my estimation, her soul were flying beside Theagenes and sharing his passion for the race.)

Heliodorus still shows Theagenes in another athletic competition in Book 10, before the dénouement of the novel: he must win a competition with two savage animals, a horse and a bull, and thereafter against an Ethiopian giant; his strength and address appear so extraordinary that King Hydaspes recognizes his superiority (10.32.3–4):

Μια̑ς δὴ ο images ν βοη̑ς ἐπὶ τούτοις καὶ γεγωνοτέρας ἢ τὸ πρότερον ὑπὸ του̑ πλήθους ἀρθείσης, οὐδὲ ὁ βασιλεὺς ἐκαρτέρησεν ἀλλ᾿ ἀνήλατό τε του̑ θρόνου καὶ < <Ὢ τη̑ς ἀνάγκης> > ἔλεγεν · <<ο images ον ἄνδρα καταθύειν ὑπὸ του̑ νόμου πρόκειται.> > (At this, with one voice, the people erupted into a clamor even more deafening than before. Even the king could not restrain himself: “O Destiny, what a man the law obliges us to sacrifice!”)

It is clear that Heliodorus shows those athletic exploits as a reality since they are actually accomplished by Theagenes. However, the fact that Charicleia also is sometimes called an athlete and, above all, the constant reflexive dimension of the narrative give those competition narratives a metaphorical echo: as Calasiris explicitly says, it is love that gives Theagenes wings and makes him a winner.

Until now, we analyzed well-known metaphors (fire, war, athleticism) that are found both in the novels and in poetry, which may lead to the conclusion that the novel found in poetic tradition an idiom and language that allowed it to be able to put in words the love adventures encountered by its young heroes. Other metaphors seem to occur more seldom, in novels as well as in poetry, but the similarities that can be proved may still make us confident that the authors of the most elaborate of the novels had a very good knowledge of the whole of Greek poetry.

Pirates and Piracy

When writing Les lieux communs du roman (Létoublon 1993), I felt that the frequency of the theme of piracy in Greek novels might account for a general impression that it was playing a metaphorical role. At that time, looking for proof, I found three examples, one in Daphnis and Chloe and two in Achilles Tatius. We may now quote more instances:

Achilles Tatius 6.22: ο images τος γὰρ ὄντως γέγονέ μου λῃστής…εἰ δὲ ὑμει̑ς τοιαυ̑τα ποιει̑τε, ἀληθινὸν του̑το πειρατήριον. (He [Sosthenes] is my principal despoiler. The rest were more moderate than you two; none of them was such a rapist. Look at what you are doing: you are the real pirates!)
7.5: δύο ἐξέϕυγες λῃστήρια, τὸ δὲ τη̑ς Μελίτης πεφόνευκέ σε πειρατήριον. (You escaped from two gangs of cutthroats, but Melite’s pirates have killed you.)
8.5: ὅτι καὶ ἐν μέσοις λῃσται̑ς ἔμεινε παρθένος καὶ τὸν μέγαν ἐνίκησε λῃστήν, Θέρσανδρον λέγω, τὸν ἀναίσχυντον, τὸν βίαιον. (… that even in the midst of bandits she remained a virgin, and conquered that great bandit, I mean Thersandros the Shameless, Thersandros the Violent.)
8.17.3 : μή με νομίσῃς λῃστὴν ε images ναί τινα καὶ κακου̑ργον, ἀλλὰ γάρ εἰμι τω̑ν ε images γεγονότων, γένει Βυζάντιος, δεύτερος οὐδενός: ἔρως δέ με λῃστείας ὑποκριτὴν πεποίηκε καὶ ταύτας ἐπὶ σοὶ πλέξαι τὰς τέχνας. (about the youth who raped Kalligone, in Sostratos’ narrative) Lady, do not think me a common criminal or cutthroat, for I am nobly born, a Byzantine second to none. Eros had made me act the role of a robber and weave this plot against you.
Daphnis and Chloe 1.32 (after Daphnis escaped the pirates and the tempest): Εδόκει τὸ λουτρὸν ε images ναι τη̑ς θαλάσσης φοβερώτερον · ψυχὴν ἔτι παρὰ τοι̑ς λῃσται̑ς μένειν, ο images α νέος καὶ ἄγροικος καὶ ἔτι ἀγνοω̑ν τὸ ἔρωτος λῃστήριον. (The bath seemed more terrible than the sea. He thought he must have left his life behind with the pirates—for he was young and a country boy and still ignorant of the piracy of love.)

We may add Chaireas and Callirhoe 7.7: Νυ̑ν ἀληθω̑ς αἰχμαλωτός εἰμι (“now I am actually a prisoner”) and refer to the analysis I published with N. Boulic. Let us note here briefly the frequency of remarks on the “truth” of the condition created by the metaphor, be it with λῃστ- or with πειρατ-: ὄντως, ἀληθινὸν, ἀληθω̑ς—it appears again and again in the text, and precisely when it is not true, so that it stresses the metaphorical use of the piracy theme.

While looking for stronger evidence in favor of the initial idea, an advanced student suggested, and I eventually found, two poems in the Greek Anthology:

Τί κλαίεις, φρενολῃστά; τί δ᾿ ἄγρια τόξα καὶ ἰούς
ἔρριψας διφυη̑ ταρσὸν ἀνεὶς πτερύγων;
images ῥά γε καὶ σὲ Μυΐσκος ὁ δύσμαχος ὄμμασιν αἴθει; (Meleager 12.144 )
(Why weepest thou, O stealer of the wits? Why hast thou cast away thy savage bow and arrows, folding thy pair of outstretched wings? Doth Myiscus, ill to combat, burn thee, too, with his eyes? How hard it has been for thee to learn by suffering what evil thou wast wont to do of old!¹⁰)

And, 13.198 by Maecius:

Κλαι̑ε δυσεκφύκτως σφιγχθεὶς χέρας, ἄκριτε δαι̑μον,
κλαι̑ε μάλα, στάζων ψυχοτακη̑ δάκρυα,
σωφροσύνας ὑβριστά, φρενοκλόπε, λῃστὰ λογισμου̑,
πτανὸν πῦρ, ψυχα̑ς τραυ̑μ᾿ ἀόρατον, Ἔρως.
θνατοι̑ς μὲν λύσις ἐστὶ γόων ὁ σός, ἄκριτε, δεσμός. (AP 16.198.3)
(Weep, thou wrong-headed god, with thy hands made fast beyond escape; weep bitterly, letting fall soul-consuming tears, scorner of chastity, thief of the mind, robber of the reason, Love, thou winged fire, thou unseen wound in the soul. Thy bands, O wrong-headed boy, are to mortals a release from complaint; remain fast bound, sending thy prayers to the deaf winds and watch that torch that thou, eluding all vigilance, didst light in men’s hearts, being quenched now by thy tears.¹¹)

The main thing is that Meleager was probably known by the novelists, more probably by Achilles Tatius, possibly by Longus. The singular evidence in Chariton might show he was less infused with Hellenistic epigrams than the other two. Though it was somehow unexpected, some metaphors even appear in Xenophon of Ephesus, for example 3.10.2: Τίς ἄρα λῃστὴς οὔτως ἐρωτικός, ἵνα καὶ νεκρα̑ς ἐπιθυμήσῃ σου (“What pirate, he exclaimed, is so much in love as to desire your corpse and even take your body away?”). We definitely did not meet the pirate metaphor in Heliodorus. However, as we shall show with the following case study, the magnetic stone, Heliodorus may have used metaphors without any formal occurrence of the words themselves.

As a provisional conclusion, we note that the pirates and robbers as metaphors in the novels seem to come from the libraries rather than from reality. As Bing, Rosenmeyer, and recently Cusset, in French, have attested, Greek poetic tradition was a “Well-Read” one, and imitation was a mark of distinction. The novel still more so since it incorporated the whole of Greek poetry, and theater too, as we will show in the following chapter (Chapter 22). The novels show how diverse and even contradictory love may be, and use several types of expressions for this diversity, specifically using metaphors for their poetical potentialities.

Magnetism of Love

Among the very rhetorical discourses held by one or the other of the male characters in Leucippe and Clitophon, the long passage in Book I already referred to was probably inspired from the Platonic dialogues on the same subject of love (Symposion, Phaedrus, Alcibiades). The fact that the narrative puts it in a dialogue between Clitophon and his servant Satyros stresses the parodic echo of Plato. Anyway, the dialogue initiated in 1.16 develops the following subjects as arguments in favor of love:

Peacock plumage
Birds, vegetation, and even stones (1.17.1: ἐπεὶ καὶ αὐτὸς ἔχει πτερόν, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἑρπετω̑ν καὶ φυτω̑ν, ἐγὼ δὲ δοκω̑ μοι, καὶ λίθων [“Since he too has wings, his influence on them (birds) is no surprise—but say rather, even by reptiles and plants, and if you ask my opinion, even by the stones.”])
Palm tree (1.17.3–5)
Male river Alpheus and (female) spring Arethusa (1.18.1–2)
Viper and moray (1.18.3–5).

The example of the stones (1.17.2) as subject to love is consciously paradoxical: stones are usually seen as metals that are the paradigmatic instance of insensibility and inflexibility (for Homeric Greek and later, see Létoublon-Montanari 2004), but the dialectical rhetorics of Satyros show them as moved by love. The plural use of λίθων is occupied by the singular λίθος in the following sentence:

ἐρᾳ̑ γου̑ν ἡ Μαγνησία λίθος του̑ σιδήρου· κἂν μόνον ἴδῃ καὶ θίγῃ, πρὸς αὑτὴν εἵλκυσεν, ὥσπερ ἐρωτικὸν ἔνδον ἔχουσα πυ̑ρ. καὶ μή τι τοῦτό ἐστιν ἐρώσης λίθου καὶ ἐρωμένου σιδήρου φίλημα (There is a stone of Magnetia that has a strong desire for iron. If she but sees and barely touches a piece of iron, she draws it to herself, as if by the power of an erotic fire within. This is a marvelous kiss between erotogenic stone and erotopathic iron.)

Thus, the Magnetic stone is supposed to prove that even the stones “feel” the effects of love. The history of this metaphor is not easy to trace. Two passages in Plato may give us the first key to an interpretation. Of course, only the second passage may imply that it is a poetic device. Once more, a metaphor is used that is in no case drawn from pragmatic experience of the characters, but from a long story, probably scientific at the beginning: some stones draw iron to themselves—as science may prove, it occurs because they entail a certain proportion of iron—and this fact, known from early times, gave birth to realistic accounts on some properties seen in the nature, as in a passage of Plato, Timaeus 80c:

Καὶ δὴ καὶ τὰ τω̑ν ὑδάτων πάντα ῥεύματα, ἔτι δὲ τὰ τω̑ν κεραυνω̑ν πτώματα καὶ τὰ θαυμαζόμενα ἠλέκτρων περὶ τῆς ἕλξεως καὶ τω̑ν Ἡρακλείων λίθων, πάντων τούτων ὁλκὴ μὲν οὐκ ἔστιν οὐδενί ποτε, τὸ δὲ κενὸν ε images ναι μηδὲν περιωθει̑ν τε αὑτὰ ταυ̑τα εἰς ἄλληλα, τό τε διακρινόμενα καὶ συγκρινόμενα πρὸς τὴν αὑτω̑ν διαμειβόμενα ἕδραν ἕκαστα ἰέναι πάντα, τούτοις τοι̑ς παθήμασιν πρὸς ἄλληλα συμπλεχθει̑σιν τεθαυματουργημένα τῳ̑ κατὰ τρόπον ζητου̑ντι φανήσεται. (Moreover, as to the flowing of water, the fall of the thunderbolt, and the marvels that are observed about the attraction of amber and the Heraclean stones, in none of these cases is there any attraction; but he who investigates rightly will find that such wonderful phenomena are attributable to the combination of certain conditions—the non-existence of a vacuum, the fact that objects push one another round, and that they change places, passing severally into their proper positions as they are divided or combined. [online translation, Elpenor website])

The second passage is in the Ion 533c–534:

Καὶ ὁρω̑, images Ἴων, καὶ ἔρχομαί γέ σοι ἀποφανούμενος ὅ μοι δοκει̑ του̑το ε images ναι. ἔστι γὰρ του̑το τέχνη μὲν οὐκ ὂν παρὰ σοὶ περὶ Ὁμήρου ε images λέγειν, ὃ νυν δὴ ἔλεγον, θεία δὲ δύναμις ἥ σε κινει̑, ὥσπερ ἐν τῃ̑ λίθῳ ἣν Εὐριπίδης μὲν Μαγνη̑τιν ὠνόμασεν, οἱ δὲ πολλοὶ Ἡρακλείαν. Kαὶ γὰραὕτη ἡ λίθος οὐ μόνον αὐτοὺς τοὺς δακτυλίους ἄγει τοὺς σιδηρου̑ς, ἀλλὰ καὶ δύναμιν ἐντίθησι τοι̑ς δακτυλίοις ὥστ’ α images δύνασθαι ταὐτὸν του̑το ποιει̑ν ὅπερ ἡ λίθος, ἄλλους ἄγειν δακτυλίους, ὥστ’ ἐνίοτε ὁρμαθὸς μακρὸς πάνυ σιδηρίων καὶ δακτυλίων ἐξ ἀλλήλων ἤρτηται · πα̑σι δὲ τούτοις ἐξ ἐκείνης τη̑ς λίθου ἡ δύναμις ἀνήρτηται. οὕτω δὲ καὶ ἡ Μου̑σα ἐνθέους μὲν ποιει̑ αὐτή, διὰ δὲ τω̑ν ἐνθέων τούτων ἄλλων ἐνθουσιαζόντων ὁρμαθὸς ἐξαρτα̑ται. πάντες γὰρ οἵ τε τω̑ν ἐπω̑ν ποιηταὶ οἱ ἀγαθοὶ οὐκ ἐκ τέχνης ἀλλ’ ἔνθεοι ὄντες καὶ κατεχόμενοι πάντα ταυ̑τα τὰ καλὰ λέγουσι ποιήματα, καὶ οἱ μελοποιοὶ οἱ ἀγαθοὶ ὡσαύτως, ὥσπερ οἱ κορυβαντιω̑ντες οὐκ ἔμφρονες ὄντες ὀρχου̑νται, οὕτω καὶ οἱ μελοποιοὶ οὐκ ἔμφρονες ὄντες τὰ καλὰ μέλη ταυ̑τα ποιου̑σιν, ἀλλ’ ἐπειδὰν ἐμβω̑σιν εἰς τὴν ἁρμονίαν καὶ εἰς τὸν ῥυθμόν, βακχεύουσι καὶ κατεχόμενοι, ὥσπερ αἱ βάκχαι ἀρύονται ἐκ τω̑ν ποταμω̑ν μέλι καὶ γάλα κατεχόμεναι, ἔμφρονες δὲ ο images σαι οὔ, καὶ τω̑ν μελοποιῶν ἡ ψυχὴ τοῦτο ἐργάζεται, ὅπερ αὐτοὶ λέγουσι. λέγουσι γὰρ δήπουθεν πρὸς ἡμα̑ς οἱ ποιηταὶ ὅτι ἀπὸ κρηνω̑ν μελιρρύτων ἐκ Μουσω̑ν κήπων τινω̑ν καὶ ναπω̑ν δρεπόμενοι τὰ μέλη ἡμι̑ν φέρουσιν ὥσπερ αἱ μέλιτται, καὶ αὐτοὶ οὕτω πετόμενοι · καὶ ἀληθη̑ λέγουσι. (SOCRATES: I perceive, Ion; and I will proceed to explain to you what I imagine to be the reason of this. The gift which you possess of speaking excellently about Homer is not an art, but, as I was just saying, an inspiration; there is a divinity moving you, like that contained in the stone which Euripides calls a magnet, but which is commonly known as the stone of Heraclea. This stone not only attracts iron rings, but also imparts to them a similar power of attracting other rings; and sometimes you may see a number of pieces of iron and rings suspended from one another so as to form quite a long chain: and all of them derive their power of suspension from the original stone. In like manner, the Muse first of all inspires men herself; and from these inspired persons a chain of other persons is suspended, who take the inspiration. For all good poets, epic as well as lyric, compose their beautiful poems not by art, but because they are inspired and possessed. And as the Corybantian revelers when they dance are not in their right mind, so the lyric poets are not in their right mind when they are composing their beautiful strains: but when falling under the power of music and metre, they are inspired and possessed; like Bacchic maidens who draw milk and honey from the rivers when they are under the influence of Dionysus but not when they are in their right mind. And the soul of the lyric poet does the same, as they themselves say; for they tell us that they bring songs from honeyed fountains, culling them out of the gardens and dells of the Muses; they, like the bees, winging their way from flower to flower. And this is true. [online translation, Elpenor website])

The Magnetic stone is known by several Greek names (Magnesia, Magnetis, but also Herakleia, Lydian, etc.), which does not make the task easy. I researched the TLG with this plurality in mind, but I do not pretend it is a complete analysis.

The second passage in Plato’s Ion refers itself to Euripides, with two of those denominations, thus considered synonyms: this fragment (567.2 Nauck) mentioned a “divine power” (θεία δὲ δύναμις) which might reveal the deepest layer of meaning for the metaphorical use of this stone. Other tragic fragments may also be mentioned (Aesch. fr. 326a, Soph. fr. 800.1) where the erotic meaning is more or less clear.

The metaphor in Plato’s Ion aims to define how poetic inspiration works, drawn up to sublime heights by an invisible strength and power, which acts like the Magnetic attraction. It is not a metaphor for human love. Unhappily, we do not possess any context for the tragic fragments. However, it does not seem too audacious to suppose that the metaphor could account for an attempt at defining love and passions, that eternal element in tragic plots. At least one epigrammatic poem in the Greek Anthology attests this:

Εἰ δ᾽ ἐσιδών, ὦ ξεῖνε, πυριϕλέκτοισι πόθοισιν
Οὐκ ἐδάμης, πάντως ἢ θεὸς ὴ λίθος εἶ. (AP 12.151)
(Stranger, if you sawest somewhere among the boys one whose bloom was most lovely, undoubtedly thou sawest Apollodotus. And if, having seen him, thou wast not overcome by burning fiery desire, of a surety thou art either a god or a stone.)

And, also the following:

Μάγνης Ἡράκλειτος, ἐμοῖ πόθος, οὔτι σίδηρον
Πέτρῳ, πνεῦμα δ᾽ ἐμὸν κάλλει ἐϕελκόμενος. (AP 12.152)
(Heraclitus, my beloved, is a Magnet, not attracting iron by stone, but my spirit with his beauty.)

Those metaphors—on piracy as well as magnetism—meet in a novel written by an author who is well-read, but not erudite enough to know how he could mask or cover his literacy, as Achilles Tatius appears in my opinion. We suppose Heliodorus had an equivalent knowledge of literature as Achilles Tatius or Longus, but he was more subtle and able to express this type of metaphorical images directly through his narrative and the events his characters endured, without needing to use such theoretical discourses about love such as those of Clitophon and Satyros, nor such episodes as Daphnis escaping the danger of piracy and comparing it to that of love, which he feels a stronger épreuve than the real pirates. In the Aethiopica, the metaphor of piracy is not formally developed, but the two competing gangs who appear in the opening scene of the novel along with the sun shining over the sea and Egyptian coast might be one of the devices suggesting it. Later, the revelation of the chief of the brigands Thyamis as a priest, Calasiris’ son, and his replaying of the fight fought by the enemy brothers under the Theban wall might be another one.

The metaphor of magnetism is not formally attested in the text. I nevertheless think it explains the mutual, “divine” attraction felt by Theagenes and Charicleia. Note their first encounter as narrated by Calasiris (3.5.4):

καὶ ὅτι θεῖον ἡ ψυχὴ καὶ συγγενὲς ἄνωθεν τοῖς ἔργοις ἐπιστούμεθα: ὁμοῦ τε γὰρ ἀλλήλους ἑώρων οἱ νέοι ἤρων, ὥσπερ τῆς ψυχῆς έκ πρώτης ἐντεύξεως τὸ ὅμοιον ἐπιγνούσης καὶ πρὸς τὸ κατ’ ἀξίαν οἰκεῖον προσδραμούσης. (And in that instant, it was revealed to us, Knemon, that the soul is something divine, and partakes in the nature of heaven. For at the moment when they set eyes on one another, the young pair fell in love as if the soul recognized its kin at the very first encounter and sped to meet that which was worthily its own.)

The Platonic tone is self-evident, and the words may be compared to several passages in the Phaedrus, the Symposium, and the Alcibiades. The “divine” mediation between the souls echoes the Symposium’s famous image of two halves of the same egg looking for each other, coined by Aristophanes, and the metaphysical view held by Diotima, although people often quote Aristophanes’ image as if it were Plato’s very view. If we take into account the magnetic metaphor also met in Plato’s œuvre, it can be said that love is a first instance of the divine attraction similar to the magnetic one, which is seen in natural phenomena. The Ion goes further and uses the metaphor for the still higher theme of poetic inspiration.

In the Aethiopica, too, the strange impression of a text expressing more than what the words themselves mean might be explained by the extraordinary cultural density of the text: Heliodorus seems to have read and devoured the whole of Greek literature, with the result that he may allude to many other texts at once without any overbearing eruditeness. A similar feeling of a metaphor present without being explicitly expressed is found in Apuleius in the tale of Cupid and Psyche, which is also visibly inspired by the same Platonic echoes as in the Aethiopica (see, especially, Met. 5.21–23), though Psyche and Eros eventually fail in the worldly, material plane.¹²

Greek love poetry, from Sappho to the Hellenistic epigrams, was an important part of the literary paideia that the novelists possessed and sometimes displayed through several allusions, which we probably did not explore fully. Some parallels between Achilles Tatius and Longus particularly lead toward this hypothesis. In Heliodorus, actual quotations seem somehow “deleted,” but the deep impregnation of this poetical culture, mixed with a Platonician or neo-Platonic inspiration, gives his novel an intense poetical atmosphere.

Notes

1 We know from other ancient sources that Eriphyle’s necklace was first Harmonia’s: this object, owned by several women in the course of time, seems to have been a bad omen for people around it; the passage entails two allusions to the myth of Philomela and Prokne, one to the myth of Bellerophon (Sthenoboe was the hero’s stepmother, who tried to seduce him, and denounced him to his father), and one to Agamemnon’s adulterous mother Aerope. The whole series deals with women’s crimes and punishments.

2 We cannot deal at large in this limited space with the main problem of the evolution of Greek literature and birth of the genres. For a recent approach of the problem, see Bowie 2008; on“reading the novel through genre,” see Goldhill 2008, 196–199, who explores the limits of the genre and concludes against Nimis’ definition of the novel as “anti-generic” (199 n. 40).

3 The passage is quoted in Laird 2008, 205: “Clitophon is using this cod-philosophising as a strategy to seduce Leucippe.”

4 On those Aitia, see Philippides 1980–1981, who shows they are not “digressive,” but follow the coherence and progression of the plot. He stressed the importance of Phatta’s tale and the presence of Pitys in it and in the whole.

5 See Létoublon 1993, 164. It is interesting to note that mythological paradigms are not invoked as a whole until the end: Daphne’s metamorphosis as a way for escaping the god’s rape should induce Clitophon to be careful.

6 On the paragone, thus called after an Italian word to be traced back to the Renaissance—between the arts—see the famous sentence attributed to Simonides in classical Greek, kept by Plutarch (Mor. De glor. Athen.346.F 5) and others, and the critical work Fumaroli 1996.

7 On Philetas as a literary character, see Di Marco 2000: for Di Marco, he is not the Philetas mentioned in Theocritus, but rather a nome parlante fitting for a praeceptor amoris (26) deriving from Theocritean Lycidas. Furthermore, Di Marco defends the thesis of the allusions to Virgil’s Bucolics with some convincing textual arguments, which we cannot reproduce here in detail.

8 After a chapter called Symbolon, where she emphasizes the role of metaphor (73–74) and paradox, Carson 1986 writes four chapters on the Greek novel before coming back to Sappho’s, Aeschylus’, and Bellerophon’s “Folded Meanings.”

9 See in the Greek Anth. 5.293, 7.448.2–3, 449.1–3, Πραταλίδα παι̑δειον Ἔρως πόθον…:
μου̑σα χόρους, Ἄρης ἐγγυάλιξε μάχαν.
Πω̑ς οὐκ εὐαίων ὁ Λυκάστιος, ὃς καὶ ἔρωτι / ἄρχει…, etc.

10 The Greek Anthology with an English translation by W.R. Paton, Vol. 4, Cambridge MA, 1956.

11 Anthologia Graeca, H. Beckby, ed., 16.198.3. Translation W.R. Paton, Cambridge MA, 1960 (The Greek Anthology V, 1960). The following epigram, 199, by Crinagoras, shows analog devices, beginning with καὶ κλαι̑ε καὶ στέναζε, but does not imitate the φρενολῃστά of Meleager, twice recalled in Maecius’ poem.

12 Similar Platonic echoes may be seen in Achilles Tatius and even in Xenophon Ephesius, which seems to imply that the theory of Love was not especially learned. It is possible that some of the novelists did not know the Platonic texts, but only summaries available for a schooling use, as, for instance, Alcinoos’ Didaskalikos (Whittaker and Louis 1990, § 23 on philia and eros).

References

Alaux, J. and F. Létoublon. 1998. “Athlotetousa tychè. Les vicissitudes des choses humaines dans le roman grec: l’exemple des Éthiopiques.” In La tradition créatrice du théâtre antique, edited by J.-C. Turpin and P. Sauzeau. Montpellier: Cahiers du GITA, pp. 145–170.

Bowie, E. 2008. “Literary milieux.” In The Cambridge Companion to the Greek and Roman Novel, edited by T. Whitmarsh. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 17–38.

Carson, A. 1986. Eros the Bittersweet: An Essay. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Chalk, H.H.O. 1960. “Eros and the Lesbian pastoral of Longus.” Journal of Hellenic Studies, 80: 32–61.

Cueva, E.P. 2004. The Myths of Fiction: Studies in the Canonical Greek Novels. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

Curtius, E.R. 1953. European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages. Princeton: Princeton University Press (original ed. in German, 1948).

Di Marco, L. 2000. “Fileta praeceptor amoris: Longo Sofista e la correzione del modello bucolic.” Studi classici e orientali, 47: 9–35.

Edmonds, J.M. 1961. Elegy and Iambus, Being the Remains of All the Greek Elegiac and Iambic Poets from Callinus to Crates, Excepting the Choliambic Writers, with the Anacreontea. London: W. Heinemann.

Fusillo, M. 1989. Il romanzo Greco: polifonia ed eros. Venice: Marsilio.

Fusillo, M. 1990. “Il testo nel testo: la citazione nel romanzo Greco.” Materiali e discussioni per l’analisi dei testi classici, 25: 27–48.

Gantz, T. 1993. Early Greek Mythology. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Goldhill, S. 2008. “Genre.” In The Cambridge Companion to the Greek and Roman Novel, edited by T. Whitmarsh. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 185–200.

Greene, E., ed.1996. Re-reading Sappho: Reception and Transmission. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Hunter, R. 1983. A Study of Daphnis and Chloe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Konstan, D. 2008. “The active reader and the ancient novel.” In Readers and Writers in the Ancient Novel, edited by M. Paschalis, S. Panayotakis, and G.L. Schmeling. Ancient Novel Supplementum 12. Groningen: Barkhuis & Groningen University Library pp. 1–17.

Kurke, L. 1991. The Traffic in Praise: Pindar and the Poetics of Social Economy. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

Laird, A. 2008. “Approaching style and rhetoric.” In The Cambridge Companion to the Greek and Roman Novel, edited by T. Whitmarsh. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 201–217.

Lanata, G. 1996. “Sappho’s amatory language,” translated from the Italian. In Re-reading Sappho: Reception and Transmission, edited by E. Greene. Berkeley: University of California Press, pp. 11–25.

Létoublon, F. 1993. Les lieux communs du roman: stéréotypes grecs d’aventure et d’amour. Leiden, New York, and Cologne: Brill, Mnemos. Suppl. 123.

Létoublon, F. 2007. “L’Amour athlete.” In Troïka: parcours antiques / 1 Mélanges offerts à Michel Woronoff, edited by S. David-Guignard and É. Geny. Besançon: Presses Univ. de Franche-Comté, pp. 331–340.

Létoublon, F. 2008a. “Pirates des cœurs.” In Culture classique et christianisme. Mélanges offerts à Jean Bouffartigue, edited by D. Auger and E. Wolff. Paris: Picard, pp. 293–300.

Létoublon, F. 2008b. “Λύτο γούνατα: d’Homère aux romans grecs.” In Φιλευριππίδης. Phileurippidès, Mélanges offerts à François Jouan, edited by D. Auger and J. Peigney. Paris: Presses universitaires de Paris, pp. 713–723.

Létoublon, F. and F. Montanari, 2004. “Les métaphores homériques. L’exemple du cœur de fer.” In Skhèma / figura: formes et figures chez les Anciens. Rhétorique, philosophie, littérature, edited by M.S. Celentano, P. Chiron, and M.-P. Noël. Paris: Éditions rue d’Ulm, pp. 31–46.

Morales, H. 2008. “The history of sexuality.” In The Cambridge Companion to the Greek and Roman Novel, edited by T. Whitmarsh. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 39–55.

Morgan, J.R. 2004. Longus, Daphnis and Chloe. Oxford: Aris & Phillips.

Morgan, J.R. and S. Harrison. 2008. “Intertextuality.” In The Cambridge Companion to the Greek and Roman Novel, edited by T. Whitmarsh. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 218–236.

Pattoni, M. 2005. Longo Sofista, Dafni e Cloe. Milan: BUR.

Philippides, M. 1980–1981. “The ‘digressive’ Aitia in Longus.” Classical World, 74: 193–199.

Rissman, L. 1983. Love as War: Homeric Allusion in the Poetry of Sappho. Königstein/Ts.: Anton Hain.

Rohde, E. 1876. Der griechische Roman und seine Vorläufer. Leipzig: Breitkopf, repr. Darmstadt, 1974.

Russell, D.A., and M. Winterbottom. 1972. Ancient Literary Criticism: The Principal Texts in New Translations. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Selden, D. 1994. “Genre of genre.” In The Search for the Ancient Novel, edited by J. Tatum. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, pp. 39–64.

Whitmarsh, T. 2008. “Class.” In The Cambridge Companion to the Greek and Roman Novel, edited by T. Whitmarsh. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 72–87.

Whittaker, J. and P. Louis. 1990. Alcinoos. Enseignement des doctrines de Platon. Paris: Lettres.

Winkler, J.J. 1982. “The mendacity of Kalasiris and the narrative strategy of Heliodoros’ Aithiopika.” Yale Classical Studies, 27: 93–158.

Winkler, J.J. 1985. Auctor and Actor: A Narratological Reading of Apuleius’ Golden Ass. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Winkler, J.J. 1990. The Constraints of Desire: The Anthropology of Sex and Gender in Ancient Greece. New York and London: Routledge.

Zimmermann, B. 1997. “Die Symphonie der Texte. Zur Intertextualität im griechischen Liebesroman.” In Der antike Roman und seine mittelalterliche Rezeption, edited by M. Picone and B. Zimmermann. Basel: Birkhäuser, pp. 3–13.

Further Readings

Alaux, J. and F. Létoublon. 2005. “La grotte et la source. Paysage naturel et artifice dans Daphnis et Chloé et Leucippé et Clitophon.” In Lieux, décors et paysages de l’ancien roman des origines à Byzance, edited by B. Pouderon and D. Crismani. Lyon: Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée, pp. 57–74.

Anderson, G. 1982. Eros Sophistes: Ancient Novelists at Play. Chico: Scholar’s Press.

Auerbach, E. 2003. Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature (rev. ed.). Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Bakhtin, M.. 1981a. The Dialogic Imagination (rev. ed.), edited by M. Holquis. Austin: University of Texas Press.

Bakhtin, M. 1981b. “The epic and the novel: Towards a methodology for the study in the novel.” In The Dialogic Imagination, edited by M. Holquist. Austin: University of Texas Press, pp. 3–40.

Bartsch, S. 1989. Decoding the Ancient Novel: The Reader and the Role of Description in Heliodorus and Achilles Tatius. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Bing, P. 1988. The Well Read Muse: Present and Past in Callimachus and the Hellenistic Poets. Göttingen: Vandenhœck & Ruprecht.

Boulic, N. and F. Létoublon, forthcoming. “Pirates in the library.” In Proceedings of ICAN 2008, edited by Marilia Futre Pinheiro. Groningen: Barkhuis & Groningen University Library.

Bowie, E. 1996. “The ancient readers of the Greek novel.” In The Novel in the Ancient World, Mnemos Suppl., edited by G.L. Schmeling. Leiden: Brill, pp. 87–106.

Bowie, E. 2005. “Metaphor in Daphnis and Chloe.” In Metaphor and the Ancient Novel, Ancient Novel Suppl. 4, edited by S.J. Harrison, M. Paschalis, and S. Frangoulidis. Groningen: Barkhuis, pp. 68–86.

Bowie, E. 1996. “The ancient readers of the Greek novel.” In The Novel in the Ancient World, Mnemos Suppl., edited by G.L. Schmeling. Leiden: Brill, pp. 87–106.

Branham, B. 2005. “The Bakhtin circle and ancient narrative.” In The Bakhtin Circle and Ancient Narrative, edited by B. Branham. Ancient Narrative Supplementum 3. Groningen: Barkhuis, pp. xi–xxiv.

Brethes, R. 1999. “Clitophon ou une Anthologie de l’anti-héros.” In Les personnages du roman grec, Actes du colloque de Tours, 18–20 November 1999, edited by B. Pouderon, C. Hunzinger, and D. Kasprzyck. Lyon: Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée, pp. 181–191.

Brethes, R. 2006. “Le discours du prêtre chez Achille Tatius (VIII, 9): une déconstruction de la paideia.” In Discours et débats dans l’ancien roman, edited by B. Pouderon and J. Peigney. Lyon: Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée, pp. 177–189.

Brethes, R. 2007. De l’idéalisme au réalisme: une étude du comique dans le roman grec. Salerno: Helios.

Brethes, M. 2009. “Le sexe des passions et des vertus. Anthropologie culturelle, métafiction et rhétorique dans le roman d’Achille Tatius.” In Passions, vertus et vices dans l’ancien roman, edited by B. Pouderon and C. Bost-Pouderon. Lyon: Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée, pp. 329–353.

Calame, C. 1996. L’Eros dans la Grèce antique. Paris: Belin.

Cameron, A. 1993. The Greek Anthology from Meleager to Planudes. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Cameron, A. 2004. Greek Mythography in the Roman World. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Canfora, L. 1987. Storie d’amore antiche: Leucippe e Clitofonte, Dafni e Cloe, Anzia e Abrocome. Bari: Dedalo.

Canfora, L. 2004. “Le roman.” In Histoire de la littérature grecque à l’époque hellénistique, edited by L. Canfora, M. Raiola, and L. Sanchi. Paris: Éd. Desjonquères, pp. 199–206.

Carrière, J.-C. 1979. Le carnaval et la politique. Paris: Les Belles Lettres.

Catoni, M.L. 2008. La comunicazione non verbale nella Grecia Antica. Turin: Bollati Boringhieri.

Chew, K. 2000. “Achilles Tatius and parody.” Classical Journal, 96: 57–70.

Connors, C. 2008. “Politics and spectacles.” In The Cambridge Companion to the Greek and Roman Novel, edited by T. Whitmarsh. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 162–181.

Conte, G.B. 1994. Genres and Readers: Lucretius, Love Elegy, Pliny’s Encyclopedia, with a foreword by Charles Segal. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Couraud-Lalanne, S. 1998. “Théâtralité et dramatisation rituelle dans le roman grec.” Groningen Colloquia on the Novel, 9: 1–16.

Crismani, D. 1997. Il teatro nel romanzo ellenistico d’amore e di avventure. Alessandria: Edizioni dell’Orso.

Cunningham, L.C. 1987. Herodas: Mimiambi. Cum appendice fragmentorum mimorum papyraceorum. Leipzig: Teubner.

Curtius, E.R. 1983. European Literature and the Latin Middle Ages: Princeton: Princeton University Press. (1990 with a new afterword by P. Godman).

Cusset, C. 1999. La Muse dans la bibliothèque. Réécriture et intertextualité dans la littérature alexandrine. Paris: CNRS.

De Temmerman, K. 2007. “Where philosophy and rhetoric meet: Character typification in the Greek novel.” In Philosophical Presence in the Ancient Novel, edited by J.R. Morgan and M. Jones. Ancient Novel Supplementum 10. Groningen: Barkhuis & Groningen University Library, pp. 85–110.

Degl’Innocenti Pierini, R. 2003. “Finale di tragedia.” Studi italiani di filologia classica 4th series, 1 (1–2): 160–182.

Dodds, E.R. 1951, 2004. The Greeks and the Irrational, Sather Classical Lecture XXV. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Dodds, E.R. 1965. Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety: Some Aspects of Religious Experience from Marcus Aurelius to Constantine. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Doulamis, K. 2007. “Stoic echoes and style in Xenophon of Ephesus.” In Philosophical Presence in the Ancient Novel, edited by J.R. Morgan and M. Jones. Ancient Novel Supplementum 10. Groningen: Barkhuis & Groningen University Library, pp. 151–175.

Dowden, K. 1999 “Fluctuating meanings: ‘Passage rites’ in ritual, myth, Odyssey, and the Greek romance.” In Rites of Passage in Ancient Greece: Literature, Religion, Society, edited by M. Padilla. Lewisburg: Bucknell Review, pp. 221–243.

Dubel, S. 2006. “L’hirondelle et l’épervier, le rossignol et la huppe (Achille Tatius, Leucippé et Clitophon V, 3–5): Notes sur la difficulté d’établir un mythe.” In Philomèle. Figures du rossignol dans la tradition littéraire et artistique, edited by V. Gély, J.-L. Haquette, and A. Tomiche. Clermont-Ferrand: Presses universitaires Blaise Pascal, pp. 37–52.

Durham, D.B. 1938. “Parody in Achilles Tatius.” Classical Philology, 33: 1–19.

Effe, B. 1982. “Longos: Zur Funktionsgeschichte der Bukolik in der römischen Kaiserzeit.” Hermes, 110: 65–84.

Fumaroli, M. 1994. L’Ecole du silence. Le sentiment des images au XVI^e siècle. Paris: Flammarion.

Fusillo, M. 1997. “How novels end: Some patterns of closure in ancient narrative.” In Classical Closure: Reading the End in Greek and Latin Literature, edited by D. Roberts, F. Dunn, and D. Fowler. Princeton: Princeton University Press, pp. 209–227.

Gély-Ghedira, V. 2000. La Nostalgie du moi: Echo dans la littérature européenne. Paris: Presses universitaires de France.

Goldhill, S. 1994. “The naive and knowing eye: Ecphrasis and the culture of viewing in the Hellenistic World.” In Art and Text in Ancient Greek Culture, edited by S. Goldhill and R. Osborne. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 197–223.

Goldhill, S. 2000. “Viewing and the viewer: Empire and the culture of spectacle.” In The Body Aesthetic: From Fine Art to Body Modification, edited by T.A. Siebers. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, pp. 41–74.

Goldhill, S. 2001. “The erotic eye: Visual stimulation and cultural conflict.” In Being Greek under Rome: Cultural Identity, the Second Sophistic and the Development of the Empire, edited by S. Goldhill. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 154–194.

Goldhill, S. 2002. “The erotic experience of looking: Cultural conflict and the gaze in empire culture.” In The Sleep of Reason: Erotic Experience and Sexual Ethics in Ancient Greece and Rome, edited by M.C. Nussbaum and J. Sihvola. Chicago: Chicago University Press, pp. 374–399.

Hägg, T. 1971. Narrative Technique in Ancient Greek Romances: Studies of Chariton, Xenophon Ephesius, and Achilles Tatius. Stockholm: Svenska institutet i Athen.

Halperin, D., J.J. Winkler, and F. Zeitlin, eds. 1990. Before Sexuality: The Construction of Erotic Experience in the Ancient World. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Harrison, S.J., M. Paschalis, and S. Frangoulidis, eds. 2005. Metaphor and the Ancient Novel. Ancient Novel Supplementum 4. Groningen: Barkhuis.

Hexter, R. and D. Selden, eds. 1992. Innovations of Antiquity. New York: Routledge.

Hunter, R. 1997. “Longus and Plato.” In Der antike Roman und seine mittelalterliche Rezeption, edited by M. Picone and B. Zimmermann. Basel: Birkhäuser, pp. 15–18.

Kahane, A. 2005. “Epic, novel, genre: Bakhtin and the question of history.” In The Bakhtin Circle and Ancient Narrative, edited by B. Branham. Ancient Narrative Supplementum 3. Groningen: Barkhuis, pp. 51–73.

Kahane, A. 2007. “Disjoining meaning and truth: History, representation, Apuleius’ Metamorphoses and Neoplatonist aesthetics.” In Philosophical Presence in the Ancient Novel, Ancient Novel Suppl. 10, edited by J.R. Morgan and M. Jones. Groningen: Barkhuis & Groningen University Library, pp. 245–269.

König, J. 2008. “Body and text.” In The Cambridge Companion to the Greek and Roman Novel, edited by T. Whitmarsh. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 127–144.

Konstan, D. 1987. “La rappresentazione dei rapporti erotici nel romanzo Greco.” Materiali e discussioni per l’analisi dei testi classici, 19: 9–27.

Konstan, D. 1994. Sexual Symmetry: Love in the Ancient Novel and Related Genres. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Konstan, D. 2002. “Enacting Erôs.” In The Sleep of Reason: Erotic Experience and Sexual Ethics in Ancient Greece and Rome, edited by M.C. Nussbaum and J. Sihvola. Chicago: Chicago University Press, pp. 354–373.

Lanata, G. 1966. “Sul linguaggio amoroso di Sappho.” Quaderni urbinati di cultura classica, 2: 173–186.

Lardinois, A. 2001. “Keening Sappho. Female speech genres in Sappho’s poetry.” In Making Silence Speak: Women’s Voices in Greek Literature and Society, edited by A. Lardinois and L. McClure. Princeton: Princeton University Press, pp. 75–92.

Larson, J. 2007. “A land full of gods: Nature deities in Greek religion.” In A Companion to Greek Religion, edited by D. Ogden. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 57–70.

Ledbetter, G.M. 2003. Poetics before Plato: Interpretation and Authority in Early Greek Poetry. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Létoublon, F. 1983. “Le miroir et la boucle.” Poétique, 40: 19–35.

Létoublon, F. 1992. “Un cercle d’ébène sur son bras d’ivoire. L’antiquité grecque face au métissage.” In Métissages, edited by J.-M. Racault and C. Marimoutou. Saint-Denis: Université de la Réunion, pp. 83–97.

Létoublon, F. 2003. “Les liaisons dangereuses ou les lettres dans le roman grec.” In The Ancient Novel and Beyond, edited by S. Panayotakis, M. Zimmerman, and W. Keulen. Leiden: Brill, Mnemos. Suppl. 159, pp. 271–288.

Létoublon, F. 2005 “Le don de la musique.” In Κορυφαίῳ ἀνδρί. Mélanges offerts à André Hurst, edited by A. Kolde, A. Lukinovich, and A.-L. Rey. Geneva: Droz, pp. 191–201.

Létoublon, F. 2006. “La rhétorique du suicide.” In Discours et débats dans l’ancien roman, actes du colloque de Tours, 21–23 octobre 2004, edited by B. Pouderon and J. Peigney. Lyon: Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée, pp. 263–279.

Létoublon, F. 2012. “La pierre magnétique de l’amour.” In Liber aureus. Mélanges d'antiquité et de contemporéanité offerts à Nicole Fick, textes rassemblés et édités par Sylvie Laigneau-Fontaine et Fabrice Poli, Nancy, ADRA, Études anciennes 46: 209–218.

Létoublon, F. and N. Boulic, forthcoming. “The pirates in the library.” In Proceedings of ICAN 2008. Groningen: Barkhuis & Groningen University Library.

Lukacs, G. 2000. The Theory of the Novel (1st ed. 1916), edited by M. McKeon. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

MacQueen, B.D. 1990. Myth, Rhetoric and Fiction: A Reading of Longus’ Daphnis and Chloe. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.

Manteuffel, G. 1929. “Apparatus mimici libellus.” Studia Papirologica II, Eos, 32: 27–33.

Massin, M. 2001. Les figures du ravissement: Enjeux philosophiques et esthétiques. Paris: Bernard Grasset: Monde de l’éducation.

Mignogna, E. 1996. “Il mimo Leucippe: un’ipotesi su PBerol inv. 13927 (Pack2 2437).” Rivista di cultura classica e medioevale, 38: 161–166.

Mignogna, E. 1997. “Leucippe in Tauride (Ach. Tat. 3, 15–22): mimo e ‘pantomimo’ tra tragedia e romanzo.” Materiali e Discussioni per l’analisi dei testi classici, 38: 225–236.

Morales, H. 2000. “Sense and sententiousness in the Greek novels.” In Intratextuality: Greek and Roman Textual Relations, edited by A. Sharrock and H. Morales. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 67–88.

Morales, H. 2004. Vision and Narrative in Achilles Tatius’ Leucippe and Clitophon. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Morgan, J.R. 1989. “The story of Cnemon in Heliodoros’ Aithiopikaï.” Journal of Hellenic Studies, 109: 99–113.

Morgan, J.R. 1994. “The Aithiopika of Heliodoros: Narrative as Riddle.” In Greek Fiction: The Greek Novel in Context, edited by J. Morgan and R. Stoneman. London: Routledge, pp. 97–113.

Morgan, J.R. 2007. “The representation of philosophers in Greek fiction.” In Philosophical Presence in the Ancient Novel, edited by J.R. Morgan and M. Jones. Ancient Novel Supplementum 10. Eelde: Barkhuis; Groningen: Groningen University Library, pp. 23–51.

Morgan, J.R., and R. Stoneman, eds. 1994. Greek Fiction: The Greek Novel in Context. London and New York: Routledge.

Morgan, J.R., and S.J. Harrison. 2008. “Intertextuality.” In The Cambridge Companion to the Greek and Roman Novel, edited by T. Whitmarsh. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 218–236. (Morgan, 1. The Greek Novel, 218–227; Harrison, 2. The Roman Novel, 227–236).

Most, G. 1989. “The stranger’s stratagem, self-disclosure and self-sufficiency in Greek culture.” Journal of Hellenic Studies, 109: 114–133.

Nagy, G. 1992. “Mythological exemplum in Homer.” In Innovations of Antiquity, edited by R. Hexter and D. Selden. New York: Routledge, pp. 311–331.

Nimis, S. 1999. “The sense of open-endedness in the ancient novel.” Arethusa, 32: 215–238.

Ogden, D., ed. 2007. A Companion to Greek Religion. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.

O’Sullivan, J. 1980. A Lexicon to Achilles Tatius. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter.

Panayotakis, S., M. Zimmerman, and W. Keulen, eds. 2003. The Ancient Novel and Beyond. Leiden, New York, and Cologne: Brill Suppl. 241.

Paschalis, M. and S. Frangoulidis, eds. 2002. Space in the Ancient Novel, Ancient Narrative Supplementum 1. Groningen: Barkhuis.

Pecere, O. and A. Stramaglia, eds. 1996. La letteratura di consumo nel mondo Greco-latino. Cassino: Università degli Studi di Cassino.

Perry, B.E. 1967. The Ancient Romance: A Literary-Historical Account of their Origins. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Picone, M. and B. Zimmermann, eds. 1997. Der antike Roman und seine mittelalterliche Rezeption. Basel: Birkhäuser.

Pletcher, J.A. 1997. “Euripides in Heliodoros’ Aithiopika 7–8.” Groningen Colloquia on the Novel, 9: 17–27.

Pouderon, B. and D. Crismani, eds. 2005. Lieux, décors et paysages de roman des origines à Byzance. Lyon: Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée, CMO.

Reardon, B.P. 1989. Collected Ancient Greek Novels. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Reardon, B.P. 1991. The Form of Greek Romance. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Repath, I. 2007. “Emotional conflict and platonic psychology in the Greek novel.” In Philosophical Presence in the Ancient Novel, edited by J.R. Morgan and M. Jones. Ancient Novel Supplementum 10. Groningen: Barkhuis & Groningen University Library, pp. 53–84.

Rosenmeyer, P. 2006. The Poetics of Imitation: Anacreon and the Anacreontic Tradition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Rousset, J. 1981. Leurs yeux se rencontrèrent. La scène de première vue dans le roman. Paris: Corti.

Schmeling, G.L., ed. 2003. The Novel in the Ancient World (rev. ed.). Boston: Brill, Mnemos Suppl. 159.

Smith, S.D. 2007. Greek Identity and the Athenian Past in Chariton: The Romance of Empire. Ancient Narrative Supplementum 9. Groningen: Barkhuis.

Stephens, S. 2008. “Cultural Identity.” In The Cambridge Companion to the Greek and Roman Novel, edited by T. Whitmarsh. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 56–71.

Stramaglia, A., ed. 2000. Ἔρως: Antiche trame greche d’amore. Bari: Levante.

Swain, S. 1996. Hellenism and Empire. Language, Classicism, and Power in the Greek World, AD 50–250. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Swain, S., ed. 1999. Oxford Readings in the Greek Novel. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Tatum, J., ed. 1994. The Search for the Ancient Novel. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Tilg, S. 2010. Chariton of Aphrodisias and the Invention of the Greek Love Novel. New York: Oxford University Press.

Trapp, M. 2007. “What is this Philosophia anyway?” In Philosophical Presences in the Ancient Novel, edited by J.R. Morgan and M. Jones. Ancient Novel Supplementum 10. Groningen: Barkhuis & Groningen University Library, pp. 1–22.

Van Mal Maeder, D. 2001. “Déclamations et romans. La double vie des personnages romanesques: le père, le fils et la marâtre assassine.” In Les personnages du roman grec, edited by B. Pouderon, C. Hunzinger, and D. Kasprzyck. Lyon: Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée-Jean Pouilloux, pp. 59–72.

Vilborg, E. 1955. Achilles Tatius. Leucippe and Clitophon. Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell.

Watson, P.A. 1995. Ancient Stepmothers. Myth, Misogyny and Reality. Leiden: Brill.

Whitmarsh, T. 2001. Greek Literature and the Roman Empire: The Politics of Imitation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Whitmarsh, T. 2005. “The Lexicon of love: Longus and Philetas grammatikos.” Journal of Hellenic Studies, 125: 145–148.

Willcock, M. 1964. “Mythological Paradeigma in Homer.” Classical Quarterly, 58: 142–154.

Willcock, M. 1977. “Ad hoc invention in the Iliad.” Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, 18: 41–53.

Zanetto, G. 2003. “Archaic Iambos and Greek novel: A possible connection.” In The Ancient Novel and Beyond, edited by S. Panayotakis, M. Zimmerman, and W. Keulen. Leiden, New York, and Cologne: Brill, pp. 317–328.

Zeitlin, F. 1990. “The poetics of eros: Nature, art, and imitation in Longus’ Daphnis and Chloe.” In Before Sexuality: The Construction of Erotic Experience in the Ancient World, edited by D. Halperin, J.J. Winkler, and F. Zeitlin. Princeton: Princeton University Press, pp. 417–464.

Zeitlin, F. 1994. “Gardens of desire in Longus’ Daphnis and Chloe: Nature, art, and imitation.” In The Search for the Ancient Novel, edited by J. Tatum. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, pp. 148–170.

Zeitlin, F. 2003. “Living portraits and sculpted bodies in Chariton’s theater of romance.” In The Ancient Novel and Beyond, edited by S. Panayotakis, M. Zimmerman, and W. Keulen. Leiden, New York, and Cologne: Brill, pp. 71–83.

We suggest, apart from the “Big Five Novels,” many pieces of Greek poetry: we left Homer aside here (see Létoublon 2008b), to focus mainly on the analogies with love poetry: Lyrics, Epigrams, Anacreontea (cf. the Greek Anthology).

In secondary literature, see the fascinating review Ancient Narrative and its valuable supplements that succeeded the Groningen Colloquia on the Novel, and several collective works published by well-known specialists such as Harrison, Morgan, Paschalis, Tatum, Schmeling, Panayotakis et al., Stoneman, and Swain.

A special mention is made for The Cambridge Companion to the Ancient Novel edited by Timothy Whitmarsh (2008) (especially Morgan-Harrison’s “Intertextuality,” Bowie’s “Literary Milieux,” Goldhill’s “Genre,” and Morales’ “The History of Sexuality”). Apart from this collective contribution, I was particularly impressed for the present study by Chalk’s 1960 “Eros and the Lesbian Pastoral of Longus” (Journal of Hellenic Studies, 80: 32–61). See especially Fusillo’s (1989) Il romanzo Greco: polifonia ed eros and his 1990 “Il testo nel testo”; Konstan’s (2008) “The Active Reader and the Ancient Novel”; and Winkler’s 1990 The Invention of Desire: the Anthropology of Sex and Gender in Ancient Greece.