Browse our books below. You can also search for books.
MINYARD, J.D., Mode and Value in the De Rerum Natura. A Study in Lucretius' Metrical language. Franz Steiner, Wiesbaden, 1978. XV,184p. Sewn. Series: Hermes, Einzelschriften, Heft 39. Nice copy. 'by far the larger part of the work is taken up with an analysis of repeated phrases, lines, and passages considerd as formulas, and with two appendies, one listing 'phrase formulas' acoording to position in the verse, the other repeated whole lines and passages. (...) The appendices are useful, but not nearly so much now that we have a concordance (...). Much more interesting are three short chapters discussing the implications of this research and introducing us to the mode and value of the title. Very briefly, Minyard accepts five 'modes of formal discourse', analystical, rhetorical, lyrical, dramatical, and narrative. These are assumed to be eternal verities independent of genre and culture. Unless we get the mode of the work right, we cannot judge it by the right system of values - we look for the wrong things. It is the author's contention that critics have done just this in the case of Lucretius. The work is not analytical - its arguments are 'crude almost to the point of childishness' (p.85), nor rhetorical - it is not out to persuade, nor lyrical - which requires a greater concentration of language than Lucretius possesses; it is essentially narrative, a narrative about the worrld. This is obviously an interesting, unusual restrictive. (...) But (...) it is language which puts us into touch with ideas, and ideas which are the depths of poetry; ultimately Lucretius has to be appriciated as a unity if we are to 'persentire' all his aspects.' (D.P. FOWLER and P.G. FOWLER in The Classical Review (New Series), 1980, pp.18-20). € 30.00 (Antiquarian)