What does it mean to say something is beautiful? On the one hand, beauty is associated with erotic attraction; on the other, it is the primary category in aesthetics, and it is widely supposed that the proper response to a work of art is one of objective contemplation. At its core, then, beauty is a contested concept, and both sides feel comfortable appealing to the authority of Plato, and via him, to the ancient Greeks generally. So, who is right-if either? Beauty offers an elegant investigation of ancient Greek notions of beauty and, in the process, sheds light on how we ought to appreciate the artistic achievements of the classical world. The book opens by reexamining the commonly held notion that the ancient Greeks possessed no term that can be unambiguously defined as "beauty" or "beautiful." Author David Konstan discusses a number of Greek approximations before positioning the heretofore unexamined term k�llos as the key to bridging the gap between beauty and desire, and tracing its evolution as applied to physical beauty, art, literature, and more. The book then examines corresponding terms in Biblical Hebrew and ancient Latin literature to highlight the survival of Greek ideas in the Latin West. The final chapter compares the ancient Greek conception of beauty with modern notions of beauty and aesthetics. In particular, it focuses on the reception of classical Greek art in the Renaissance and how Vasari and his contemporaries borrowed from Plato the sense that the beauty in art was transcendental, but left out the erotic dimension of viewing. Even if Greece was the inspiration for modern aesthetic ideals, this study illustrates how the Greek view of the relationship between beauty and desire was surprisingly consistent-and different from our own. This fascinating and magisterial exploration makes it possible to identify how the Greeks thought of beauty, what it was that attracted them, and what their perceptions can still tell us about art, love, desire-and beauty.

Beauty: The Fortunes of an Ancient Greek Idea (Onassis Series in Hellenic Culture)

History

Konstan, David

Ancient Civilizations

Oxford University Press

This book is about love in the classical world - not erotic passion but the kind of love that binds together intimate members of a family and very close friends, but which may also be extended to include a wider range of individuals for whom we care deeply. The book begins with a discussion of friendship, focusing particularly on the Greek notion that in friendship the identities of two friends all but merge into one. The book then turns to the question of loyalty, and why loyalty seems not to have achieved the status of a virtue in classical thought. The next chapter considers love in relation to generosity, favors, and gratitude. There follows a discussion of grief, which is a symptom of the loss of a loved one. The final chapter treats love as the basis of civic solidarity. In each case, love is at the basis of the relations under examination. In this, the book departs from the more usual analysis of these affective ties in terms of reciprocity, which in one way or another involves an expectation of return. Seen this way, such relationships seem to have a selfish or at least self-centered dimension, as distinct from truly other-regarding attitudes. While it is true that the ancient sources sometimes describe these relations, including friendship, as forms of mutual obligation, there is also a counter strand that emphasizes genuine altruism, and it is this aspect that the book seeks to bring out. A close look at how love drew into its orbit the various relations examined in this book may shed light on some central features not only of ancient habits of thought but also, it is to be hoped, our own.

In the Orbit of Love: Affection in Ancient Greece and Rome

Health, Fitness & Dieting

Mental Health

In comedy, happy endings resolve real-world conflicts. These conflicts, in turn, leave their mark on the texts in the form of gaps in plot and inconsistencies of characterization. Greek Comedy and Ideology analyzes how the structure of ancient Greek comedy betrays and responds to cultural tensions in the society of the classical city-state. It explores the utopian vision of Aristophanes' comedies--for example, an all-powerful city inhabited by birds, or a world of limitless wealth presided over by the god of wealth himself--as interventions in the political issues of his time. David Konstan goes on to examine the more private world of Menandrean comedy (including two adaptations of Menander by the Roman playwright Terence), in which problems of social status, citizenship, and gender are negotiated by means of elaborately contrived plots. In conclusion, Konstan looks at an imitation of ancient comedy by Moliére, and the way in which the ideology of emerging capitalism transforms the premises of the classical genre.

Greek Comedy and Ideology

Literature & Fiction

Dramas & Plays

In this book, David Konstan argues that the modern concept of interpersonal forgiveness, in the full sense of the term, did not exist in ancient Greece and Rome. Even more startlingly, it is not fully present in the Hebrew Bible, nor again in the New Testament, or in the early Jewish and Christian commentaries on the Holy Scriptures. It would still be centuries-- many centuries-- before the idea of interpersonal forgiveness, with its accompanying ideas of apology, remorse, and a change of heart on the part of the wrongdoer, would emerge. For all its vast importance today in religion, law, politics, and psychotherapy, interpersonal forgiveness is creation of the 18th and 19th centuries, when the Christian concept of divine forgiveness was finally secularized. Forgiveness was God's province, and it took a revolution in thought to bring it to earth and make it a human trait.

Before Forgiveness: The Origins of a Moral Idea

Self-Help

Relationships

Cambridge University Press

This book is a history of friendship in Greece and Rome, from the warrior society of the Homeric epics to the time of the Christian Roman Empire. It demonstrates how ancient friendship resembles modern conceptions, and how it evolves in different social contexts. The book sheds new light on such questions as friendship and democracy, the importance of friends in government and in philosophical communities, women's friendships, and the transformation of friendship under the influence of Christian ideas of brotherhood.

Friendship in the Classical World (Key Themes in Ancient History)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1846. Excerpt: ... With toilsome chase of Hector, thrice around 90 The wind-swept walls of Ilion. As he lay, The mournful ghost of his departed friend Before him rose;f in all things like the man; In stature, pleasing countenance and voice, And garments such as living he had worn. 95 It stood above his head, and thus address'd The slumb'ring hero: Sleepest thou, of me Forgetful, my Achilles? When alive, Neglect from thee I knew not; but, when dead, Forgotten is thy friend! My fun'ral rites 100 Perform, that speedily I may the gates Of Hades enter. Now, unpitying ghosts, Pale shadows of departed men, repulse And drive me far away, allowing not To find repose upon the farther shore 105 Of that infernal river. Vainly now, Round the wide-portall'd court of Pluto's hall, I restless wander. Give me but thy hand, I beg thee, sorrowing; for never more Shall I return from Hades to the light, no When fun'ral flames my body have consum'd. Ah! then, no longer shall we sit together, (As erst when living,) from all other friends Retir'd, with pleasant intercourse of souls Conferring and advising.11 Cruel fate 115 Has swallow'd me within her dark abyss; The fate assign'd me on my day of birth! And thee, Achilles, glorious as the gods, The same dire fate attends; to perish here, Under the ramparts of the Trojans bold. 120 Another thing I charge thee, and implore, (Neglect not thou Patroclus' last request,) Let not my bones remain apart from thine, But intermingled; for together we Were in your mansion bred, when me, a boy, 125 My father brought from home, for homicide Deplorable, effect of evil chance, That fatal day, when in my wrath, at quoits, I slew without design, the luckless son Of old Amphidamas:1 thy father then 130 Receiv'd me in his house, and cherish'd me 'With kind regard, and...

Homer's Iliad

Education & Teaching

Sider, David

Brodwin, Stanley

Studying & Workbooks

Monarch Notes

"In the Greek romances," writes David Konstan, "sighs, tears, and suicide attempts are as characteristic of the male as of the female in distress; ruses, disguises, and outright violence in defense of one's chastity are as much the part of the female as of the male." Exploring how erotic love is represented in ancient amatory literature, Konstan points to the symmetry in the passion of the hero and heroine as a unique feature of the Greek novel: they fall mutually in love, they are of approximately the same age and social class, and their reciprocal attachment ends in marriage. He shows how the plots of the novels are perfectly adapted to expressing this symmetry and how, because of their structure, they differ from classical epic, elegy, comedy, tragedy, and other genres, including modern novels ranging from Sidney to Harlequin romances.
Using works like Chaereas and Callirhoe and Daphnis and Chloe, Konstan examines such issues as pederasty, the role of eros in both marital and nonmarital love, and the ancient Greek concept of fidelity. He reveals how the novelistic formula of sexual symmetry reverses the pattern of all other ancient genres, where erotic desire appears one-sided and unequal and is often viewed as either a weakness or an aggressive, conquering power. Konstan's approach draws upon theories concerning the nature of sexuality in the ancient world, reflected in the work of Michel Foucault, David Halperin, and John Winkler.
Originally published in 1993.
The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Sexual Symmetry: Love in the Ancient Novel and Related Genres (Princeton Legacy Library)

Princeton University Press

"In the Greek romances," writes David Konstan, "sighs, tears, and suicide attempts are as characteristic of the male as of the female in distress; ruses, disguises, and outright violence in defense of one's chastity are as much the part of the female as of the male." Exploring how erotic love is represented in ancient amatory literature, Konstan points to the symmetry in the passion of the hero and heroine as a unique feature of the Greek novel: they fall mutually in love, they are of approximately the same age and social class, and their reciprocal attachment ends in marriage. He shows how the plots of the novels are perfectly adapted to expressing this symmetry and how, because of their structure, they differ from classical epic, elegy, comedy, tragedy, and other genres, including modern novels ranging from Sidney to Harlequin romances.Using works like Chaereas and Callirhoe and Daphnis and Chloe, Konstan examines such issues as pederasty, the role of eros in both marital and nonmarital love, and the ancient Greek concept of fidelity. He reveals how the novelistic formula of sexual symmetry reverses the pattern of all other ancient genres, where erotic desire appears one-sided and unequal and is often viewed as either a weakness or an aggressive, conquering power. Konstan's approach draws upon theories concerning the nature of sexuality in the ancient world, reflected in the work of Michel Foucault, David Halperin, and John Winkler.Originally published in 1993.The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

History & Criticism

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Konstan, David. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Konstan, David

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Konstan, David. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Beauty: The Fortunes of an Ancient Greek Idea (Onassis Series in Hellenic Culture)

In the Orbit of Love: Affection in Ancient Greece and Rome

Greek Comedy and Ideology

Beauty: The Fortunes of an Ancient Greek Idea (Onassis Series in Hellenic Culture)

Before Forgiveness: The Origins of a Moral Idea

Friendship in the Classical World (Key Themes in Ancient History)

Friendship in the Classical World (Key Themes in Ancient History)

Homer's Iliad

Sexual Symmetry: Love in the Ancient Novel and Related Genres (Princeton Legacy Library)

Sexual Symmetry: Love in the Ancient Novel and Related Genres (Princeton Legacy Library)