Presented as part of the Centre for Classical Studies Seminar Series

The Centre for Classical Studies warmly invites you to attend the next talk in our Seminar Series for Semester 2. After the talk in the Milgate Room, we shall continue discussion in the ANU Classics Museum over light refreshments.

‘Why are there so many instances - and so many varieties – of repetition in the oral epics that we associate with Homer's name? In this paper I begin with Deborah Tannen's observations on repetition in spontaneous conversational discourse. I then turn to the oral epic tradition that had flourished in early Greece to consider how repetition operates in its two representative poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey. In studying the epic poet's use of repetition, I draw some conclusions about how poets in this oral tradition manipulated this device in order to meet the heavy demands of performance before a "live" audience – and how those same repeated elements supported their listeners as they attempted to process the tale.

I find that repetition in oral traditional storytelling serves the functions of production, comprehension, connectedness, and interaction – the very functions that Tannen has identified in spontaneous conversation. But, as we shall see, the ways in which - and the degree to which - these functions are served are in some respects different. The highly formalized patterns of usage that we observe in these records of oral traditional epic offer us an unusually clear view of a creative mind at work.’

This event is free, and all are welcome.         

Image: Guillaume Lethière, Homer singing his Iliad at the Gates of Athens