A critical study of the love poetry of Meleager of Gadara
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Abstract
This dissertation presents a new reading of Meleager's love poetry. While making use of current scholarship that traces and categorizes motifs, this study takes a different approach in its attempt to understand the meaning behind certain of these motifs and to evaluate how effectively they are used. Chapter One, "The Pathetic Lover, contrasts the persona of the lover in Meleager's poetry with that found in the archaic love poets and in other Hellenistic epigrammatists. We can see a change in the poet's conception of love as a praxis in archaic poetry to love as a pathos in Meleager. The lover in Sappho and Ana creon takes an active part in his or her love affair, even when rejected, whereas Meleager is most often the passive victim of a passion over which he not only has no control, but which leaves him completely powerless to act in any meaningful way. We can see this transition beginning to take place with the Alexandrians, but Meleager's work is remarkable in the extent to which he treats the pathos of the lover's condition as an end in itself. He does not seek a remedium amoris, but luxuriates in the tranced passivity of that state. Chapter Two, "The Sensations of the Lover,ยท examines Meleager's use of all five senses, as well as fantasy, in his portrayal of the lover. It is shown that his description of the lover's experience is more sensual, more concrete, more real than that of the other epigrammatists, and that failure to recognize th is has led to an underreading of his poetry and lack of appreciation of his best work. Chapter Three, "Theme and Variations," examines the elcrl TP LX Ec; motif, and the motif of the bride who dies on her wedding night. These two themes are more closely connected than they appear at first glance. Both reflect a fascination with beauty at its prime and an underlying fear of its deterioration. Chapter Four, "The Stephanos, examines Meleager's use of the garland as the overriding metaphor for his work. His descriptions of garlands and their dissolution indicate his preoccupation with the ephemeral nature of beauty.
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Dissertation (Ph.D.)--Boston University
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