Ekphrasis in Ancient and Modern Literature
Creative and Academic Intersections
Ekphrasis in Ancient and Modern Literature
Creative and Academic Intersections
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Description
This volume examines the interaction between literary and visual representation through ekphrasis in contemporary poetry and ancient literature, viewing ekphrasis as a dynamic and evolving concept rather than a fixed category. Contributions from academic experts and poets address how ancient ekphrasis relates to ancient Graeco-Roman literature and contemporary poetry, thus aiming to find commonalities and differences between ancient and modern discourses and to foster cross-disciplinary collaboration, reflecting the hybrid nature of ekphrasis itself.
The book is organised around four core themes. Virtual Worlds and Embodied Images explores how ekphrasis connects the visual and the physical, while Vivid Emotions and Fluid Identities examines the impact of emotionally engaging with images. False Art and Poor Ethics looks at the relationship between ethics and aesthetics, and, finally, Absence and Presence investigates how the pursuit of absent visual objects serves as a reflection on memory and grief.
Table of Contents
Virtual Worlds and Embodied Images
1. The Virtualities of Ekphrasis from Myron's Cow to Auden's Musée des Beaux Arts, Jás Elsner (University of Oxford, UK)
2. Ekphrasis and Creation, Edmund Thomas (Durham University, UK)
3. Embodied Ekphrasis: Viewing Lucretius through Derek Mahon, Peter Kelly (Princeton University, USA)
4. Animating the Inanimate in Ancient Ekphrasis, Ruth Webb (Université de Lille, France)
Vivid Emotions and Fluid Identities
5. From Narcissus: A History, Padraig Regan (University of Cambridge, UK)
6. 'Look, Look, Wenches, / A Miserable Life of this Poor Picture': Ekphrasis, Enargeia, and Affect in Early Modern Literature, Richard Meek (University of Hull, UK)
7. Beyond the Stendhal Syndrome, Yiannis Doukas (Independent Scholar, Ireland)
False Art and Poor Ethics
8. Bad Art: Poetry's Images, John McAuliffe (University of Manchester, UK)
9. Ekphrasis as Forgery: Statius, Martial and Novius Vindex, Peter Heslin (Durham University, UK)
10. Moral Complicity in Modern and Contemporary Ekphrasis, Bridget Vincent (Aarhus Institute of Advanced Studies, Denmark)
11. The Art of the Shortcut, Vona Groarke (University of Manchester, UK)
Absence and Presence
12. Fleeting and Multiform: Ekphrasis in Trompe l'Oeil, American 1890 and Fujiko Nakaya's Cloud Sculptures, Eva Bourke (Independent Scholar, Ireland)
13. Seamus Heaney: Ekphrasis, Memory, Uncertainty, Adam Hanna (University College Cork, Ireland)
14. Ciaran Carson's Philostratean Gallery: Facing Death through Ekphrasis, Karel Thein (Charles University, Czech Republic)
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Product details
| Published | 14 May 2026 |
|---|---|
| Format | Ebook (PDF) |
| Edition | 1st |
| Extent | 272 |
| ISBN | 9781350521148 |
| Imprint | Bloomsbury Academic |
| Illustrations | 10 bw illus |
| Series | Bloomsbury Studies in Classical Reception |
| Publisher | Bloomsbury Publishing |
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