In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

140 Reviews composition of Eustathius's history, but he does discuss the historiographical problems raised by Eustathius's History in an appendix. This to m y mind provides one of the best short introductions to Byzantine historiography as a genre. Having now used this text for teaching purposes I can testify with enthusiasm to its value. The combination of a good lively translation and exceUent commentary has been much appreciated. Michael Angold Department of History University of Edinburgh Foley, J. M., The theory of oral composition: history and methodology, Indiana and Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1988; paperback; pp. xvi, 170; R.R.P. ?; Idem, ed., Oral tradition in literature: interpretation in context, Columbia, University of Missouri Press, 1986; cloth; pp. x, 190; R.P.P. ? If a personal note may be permitted, perhaps the most memorable moments from our time as Cambridge undergraduates came in Geoffrey Kirk's lectures on Homer. For most of a term he read to a roomful of somewhat bemused classicists the proofs of his forthcoming book, The Songs of Homer. As he introduced us to the world of Yugoslav guslari so vividly described by Albert Lord, it gradually became apparent that here was a totally new and incisive way of looking at Homer, at least new to those who had not followed the seminal work of Milman Parry in the 1920s and 1930s. The most significant recent development had been the publication in 1960 of Lord's The Singer of Tales, in which were summarised the results of the field work he had carried out in southern Yugoslavia, first with Parry and then in his own right. Lord analysed his results in the Yugoslav context, then applied them to the Homeric poems and also to certain medieval epics. Kirk's study was one of the first of the responses prompted by the possibilities of the 'oral-formulaic' theory as applicable to many traditional literatures of pre-literate and partially literate societies. His lectures hit us with the force of a revelation. That our responses were not untypical is demonstrated in the first of the books discussed here. In The theory of oral composition Foley sketches out the previous work that gradually led Parry to evolve this concept. H e then continues with the subsequent developments by Lord and many others that led to the appUcation of the theory to virtually every European linguistic environment, and to some others. The book is largely, though not exclusively, Eurocentric. This is an extremely useful and judiciously written survey of a controversial subject which remains a developing one. Those who come fresh to thisfield,or those who are acquainted with work done in one language area only, will find much of interest and value in the surveys and in the bibliography, which, though huge, is but an Reviews 141 extract from the author's own Oral-formulaic theory and research: an Introduction and annotated Bibliography (New York, 1985). A crucial purpose is revealed in thetitleof Chapter IV: 'The making of a discipline'. It is plain that Foley sees this area of study as atight-knit,cross-cultural discipline where the analysis of each new language and period may be expected to throw light on aU the others. In the same spirit, an annual updating of his bibliography now appears in another essential discipUnary organ, the journal Oral Tradition, founded in 1986 and edited by Foley. The book appears in a series aimed at students of folklore, and Alan Dundes contributes an introduction which emphasises the similarities between Parry's initial approaches and those of Propp in his Morphology of the Folktale, another viable perspective on oral-formulaic studies. But otherwise one should not look here for defence of the theory and analysis of criticisms made of it, as the author warns us in his introduction. This is certainly wise. The uses made of the theory are diverse and there has been a stultifying tendency for opponents to tar very dissimilar approaches with the same brush, a process which could only have been encouraged by seeking to defend them against all criticisms in a single text. Moreover, little analysis is made of the interaction of literate, semi-literate and iUiterate...

pdf

Share