Centaurs and snake-kings: hybrids and the Greek imagination

Griffins, centaurs and gorgons: the Greek imagination teems with wondrous, yet often monstrous, hybrids. Jeremy McInerney discusses how these composite creatures arise from the entanglement of humans and animals. Overlaying such enmeshment is the rich cultural exchange experienced by Greeks across t...

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Détails bibliographiques
Auteur principal: McInerney, Jeremy 1958- (Auteur)
Type de support: Électronique Livre
Langue:Anglais
Service de livraison Subito: Commander maintenant.
Vérifier la disponibilité: HBZ Gateway
WorldCat: WorldCat
Interlibrary Loan:Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany)
Publié: Cambridge New York, NY Cambridge University Press 2024
Dans:Année: 2024
Sujets non-standardisés:B Mythology, Greek
B Animals, Mythical
B Monsters Mythology (Greece)
Accès en ligne: Volltext (lizenzpflichtig)
Édition parallèle:Erscheint auch als: 9781009459105
Description
Résumé:Griffins, centaurs and gorgons: the Greek imagination teems with wondrous, yet often monstrous, hybrids. Jeremy McInerney discusses how these composite creatures arise from the entanglement of humans and animals. Overlaying such enmeshment is the rich cultural exchange experienced by Greeks across the Mediterranean. Hybrids, the author reveals, capture the anxiety of cross-cultural encounter, where similarity and incongruity were conjoined. Hybridity likewise expresses instability of identity. The ancient sea, that most changeable ancient domain, was viewed as home to monsters like Skylla; while on land the centaur might be hypersexual yet also hypercivilized, like Cheiron. Medusa may be destructive, yet also alluring. Wherever conventional values or behaviours are challenged, there the hybrid gives that threat a face. This absorbing work unveils a mercurial world of shifting categories that offer an alternative to conventional certainties. Transforming disorder into images of wonder, Greek hybrids - McInerney suggests - finally suggest other ways of being human.
Description:Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 28 May 2024)
Description matérielle:1 online resource (xvi, 354 pages), digital, PDF file(s).
ISBN:1009459066
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1017/9781009459068