Images of Greece: Byron and Thomas Hope’s Anastasius

This essay seeks to answer a question raised by Peter Cochran in an article in 2010: ‘Why did Byron envy Thomas Hope’s Anastasius?’ I argue that, central to Hope’s novel and to Byron’s alleged fascination with it, is Hope’s treatment of Greek identity, and so I begin by looking at the history of Greek self-naming. I then move on to review some of the issues surrounding the publication of Anastasius in 1819, and conclude with the analysis of a few important passages from the novel. The essay is concerned with liminality, the instability of identity in a colonised world, and with ideas of history, resistance, and ethics in an unfree society.