Access the full text.
Sign up today, get DeepDyve free for 14 days.
References for this paper are not available at this time. We will be adding them shortly, thank you for your patience.
HOW HOMERIC IS HYSTERON PROTERON ? by ELIZABETH MINCHIN It is now eighty years—we go back to a time which precedes the work of Milman Parry—since Samuel Bassett’s article on hysteron proteron in Homer brought to readers’ notice a “remarkable” device, an idiosyncracy of the poet’s style. 1 ) The term, generally speaking, refers to the poet’s preference for spelling out within his song a twofold instruction, proposal, or question and in a subsequent pas- sage reversing the original order of presentation. Bassett examines the occurrence of hysteron proteron in one particular context, which he identi ed in the spoken discourse of both the Iliad and the Odyssey . On the basis of his observations of response patterns in Homer, Bassett had concluded that when more than two questions are asked within the same speaking turn in the Homeric text, there are three possible arrangements of answers: the order of questions may be retained, or varied, or reversed. 2 ) The rst arrangement, according to Bassett, is the ‘most natural’. 3 ) He cites as an example the replies which Mentes-Athene makes to Telemachos’ questioning at Od. 1.180-194. At 1.170-177, Telemachos has asked the following ques- tions:
Mnemosyne – Brill
Published: Jan 1, 2001
Read and print from thousands of top scholarly journals.
Already have an account? Log in
Bookmark this article. You can see your Bookmarks on your DeepDyve Library.
To save an article, log in first, or sign up for a DeepDyve account if you don’t already have one.
Copy and paste the desired citation format or use the link below to download a file formatted for EndNote
Access the full text.
Sign up today, get DeepDyve free for 14 days.
All DeepDyve websites use cookies to improve your online experience. They were placed on your computer when you launched this website. You can change your cookie settings through your browser.