The Early Greek Poets and Their Times

Victor Matthews is an associate professor of classics at the University
of Guelph.

A.J. Podlecki, Professor of Classics at UBC, is a respected Canadian scholar who already has to his credit a fine biography of Themistocles (McGill-Queen’s, 1975) and a stimulating study on the political background of Aeschylean tragedy (University of Michigan, 1966).

The title of the present work is perhaps a little misleading since the book is concerned only with the lyric poets and has little to say about other genres, such as post-Homeric epic poetry—some of which could also be studied using the approach which the author adopts.

Podlecki’s declared intent is to examine the life and work of the early lyric poets in their historical context rather than their poetry as literature per se. This he does with varied success in the succeeding chapters, each of which treats two or three poets of similar type and background.

The work has been deliberately written without footnotes, and at times the reader may feel the need to examine the sources of the opposing views that Podlecki discusses (usually arriving at a balanced, though sometimes non-committal position). Podlecki does, however, provide a very useful bibliographical section at the end of his book.

The introductory chapter on Homer and early hexameter poetry is sensible and balanced. The remaining chapters are rather uneven, the best being the discussions on Archilochus, Solon, Theognis, and Stesichorus. Less satisfactory are the discussions on Alcaeus and Sappho and on Pindar and Bacchylides. The more “political” the nature of the poetry discussed, the better is Podlecki’s treatment of it.

However, the book provides an extremely useful survey (particularly for the Greekless reader) of the wide range of Greek lyric poets active in the Archaic period and effectively relates them to their historical and social backgrounds.

The book is generally well produced. A number of slips in proofreading were noticed, the most serious being a confusion (possibly something is missing) in the middle of page 83.