Is classical tragedy contingent upon a Greco-Roman sense of morality? Or can tragedy exist within a Judeo-Christian universe as well? Literary critic Northrop Frye’s theory of high-mimetic tragedy inherits distinctions that Aristotle draws between tragedy and comedy in the Poetics. As a brief philological excursion will demonstrate, the binary distinctions upon which Aristotle builds his tragic...

Abstract This paper seeks to shed fresh light on the aesthetic and stylistic affiliations of Lycophron's Alexandra , approaching poem from two distinct but complementary angles. First, it explores what can be gained by reading against backdrop Callimachus’ poetry. It contends that presents a radical polemical departure Alexandrian's poetic programme, pointedly appropriating key Callimachean ima...