The taste for nothingness : a study of virtus and related themes in Lucan's Bellum civile
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
The taste for nothingness : a study of virtus and related themes in Lucan's Bellum civile
University of Michigan Press, c2003
Access to Electronic Resource 1 items
Available at 4 libraries
  Aomori
  Iwate
  Miyagi
  Akita
  Yamagata
  Fukushima
  Ibaraki
  Tochigi
  Gunma
  Saitama
  Chiba
  Tokyo
  Kanagawa
  Niigata
  Toyama
  Ishikawa
  Fukui
  Yamanashi
  Nagano
  Gifu
  Shizuoka
  Aichi
  Mie
  Shiga
  Kyoto
  Osaka
  Hyogo
  Nara
  Wakayama
  Tottori
  Shimane
  Okayama
  Hiroshima
  Yamaguchi
  Tokushima
  Kagawa
  Ehime
  Kochi
  Fukuoka
  Saga
  Nagasaki
  Kumamoto
  Oita
  Miyazaki
  Kagoshima
  Okinawa
  Korea
  China
  Thailand
  United Kingdom
  Germany
  Switzerland
  France
  Belgium
  Netherlands
  Sweden
  Norway
  United States of America
Note
Bibliography: p. 153-155
Includes indexes
Description and Table of Contents
Description
Lucan, the young and doomed epic poet of the Age of Nero, is represented by only one surviving work: the Bellum Civile, which takes as its theme the civil war that destroyed the Roman Republic. It is an epic unlike any other. Rejecting point by point the aesthetics of Vergil's Aeneid, it describes a society and a cosmos plunged into anarchy. Language is a casualty of this anarchy; all certitudes are lost, including those traditionally attached to the Latin word virtus: heroism on the battlefield, rectitude in the conduct of life. Lucan piteously exposes the inability of these concepts to survive in his nihilistic universe.
In The Taste for Nothingness , Sklenár applies a close-reading methodology to Lucan's Bellum Civile to analyze Lucan's distortions of traditional epic forms. Sklenar's work will not only illuminate many passages of this author for classicists but also capture the attention of comparatists, as he draws fascinating comparisons between Lucan's aesthetics and those of other literary traditions. Medievalists and Renaissance specialists will find The Taste for Nothingness a readable treatment of an ancient author who casts a long shadow over the literature of those eras. Sklenar's work will also intrigue scholars of the nineteenth century decadent tradition, elucidating connections between Lucan's aesthetics and those of the fin-de-siècle tradition. From Sklenár's unique study, an even bolder Lucan emerges: a committed aesthete who regards art as the only realm in which order is possible.
by "Nielsen BookData"