Classical World

Imperial Greek literature and its relationship with classical literary tradition have always been a source of contention in the scholarly community that tries to explain Imperial authors’ creatively classicizing tendencies. Peterson contributes to this scholarly debate with a study that focuses on the reception of Old Comedy in the Imperial Greek world, arguing for an eclectic and metalinguistic use that capitalizes on the multifaceted nature of Old Comedy and Imperial authorial ingenuity.

The Introduction does a wonderful job of positioning Old Comedy within Imperial literature so as to clarify the difficulty of the task of strictly determining sources, but also to prepare the ground for a philological attempt to identify literary currents—implicit and explicit—without overestimating our ability to do so; Peterson thus justifies her focus on Aristophanic comedy.

The first chapter on Plutarch presents his ambiguous and polymodal approach to Old Comedy. Peterson perceptively distinguishes his variegated authorial viewpoints and argues that in the Comparison of Aristophanes and Menander he distinguishes Menander as the representative of literary and social order and rejects Aristophanes, all the while reviving the old comedic agonistic motif. In the Parallel Lives, Plutarch is presented as embracing yet another aspect of Old Comedy, that of abusive humor, which he had previously dismissed. Peterson concludes that such treatments “express anxiety” but “do not mirror reality.” The author should consider here that this ambivalence could actually be part of Imperial reality.

In the case of Aelius Aristides, Peterson encapsulates the author’s selective adoption of comedic elements in his defense of rhetoric. She emphasizes rightly that Aristides embraces comedic parabasis as a model for self-reflexivity but advises against the unchecked practice of comedy and the exposure of the public to it. This analysis offers a valuable insight into the afterlife of Old Comedy and the artistry of Imperial authors; but, still more importantly, the reader is furnished with a concrete background on the genre’s potential for recontextualization. [End Page 501] Also, the author’s analysis of whether Old Comedy was still performed informs her discussion of Aristides’ critical approach to Old Comedy, its multifaceted nature, and the distinction between its literary and its performative nature that in turn elucidates the differentiation between the Imperial masses and the literati.

The analysis of Lucian in the ensuing two chapters does not disappoint. Peterson summarizes previous scholarly studies of Lucian and situates herself against the backdrop of Atticism, parody, imitation, and Promethean revival of the past. Her analysis of Lucian acknowledges his authorial mechanics that use, reuse, and ultimately reinvent literature. From a seemingly close imitation of Eupolis’s Demoi in Fisherman to his use of parabatic tropes in his prolaliae, Peterson fleshes out Lucian’s novel literary personality as one who resists the stigma of “novelty” by actually using and then weaponizing approved classical literature, thereby making the case for hybrid literary styles. Peterson’s analysis is undeniably thorough, but her attempt in chapter 3 to cover all the instances of Old Comedy in Lucian has also led to a lengthy section on intellectual biography (influenced by both comedy and Plato) that slightly loses sight of the main argument. The flow is also disrupted by “A Menandrian Interlude,” which looks into Alciphron. This section does indeed do credit to Peterson for her meticulous study of Imperial literature; but it nevertheless appears somewhat intrusive, as the sectional theme is not given an individual chapter, and the connections between Menander, Old Comedy, and Alciphron have in any case long been proven to be too generic to indicate a truly special relationship between them.

Finally, fourth-century approaches to Old Comedy are shown by Peterson to be even more elusive. Libanius is presented as continuing the comedic tradition as a rhetorical maneuver and as a literary trope of autobiographical mastery and self-reflexivity. Peterson intuitively relates Old Comedy’s alternative reception as a stylistic model...