The Greek and the Latin Alexander Romance: Comparative Readings

Abstract

Comparison among the early recensions of the Alexander Romance is usu­ally made on the basis of clear-cut differences in content. Differences in style or language are treated as separate issues, and minor textual omissions or changes remain almost exclusively the concern of the editor. This paper argues that slight textual changes may affect the kind of story told and that narratives have ways to create textual or subtextual coherence where there may be a mere parataxis of self-contained stories or disconnected material or arbitrary geographical settings. A relevant conclusion is that it is not always advisable to restore or correct passages of recension β by using material that comes from A or Valerius and vice versa. 

Michael Paschalis is Professor of Classics at the University of Crete. He has published articles on Hellenistic and Roman poetry (epic, bucolic, lyric, and didactic), Senecan drama, historiography, the ancient novel, the reception of the Classics and Modern Greek literature. He is the author of Virgil's Aeneid: Semantic Relations and Proper Names (Oxford 1997) and has edited Horace and Greek Lyric Poetry (Rethymnon Classical Studies, vol. 1, Rethymnon 2002) and Roman and Greek Imperial Epic (Rethymnon Classical Studies, vol. 2, Herakleion 2005). He has co-edited Space in the Ancient Novel (Groningen 2002), Metaphor and the Ancient Novel (Groningen 2005), and The Reception of Antiquity in the Byzantine and Modern Greek Novel (Athens 2005).