This Remarkable Piece of Antiquity
Epic Conventions in Shelley'sOedipus Tyrannus;or, Swellfoot the Tyrant
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3971047 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Michael J Neth (Middle Tennessee State University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2019 |
| Volume | 24 |
| Issue | 3-4 |
| Pages | 396-422 |
| Publication date | 2019-05-19 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The European Legacy (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1084-8770 • E-ISSN: 1470-1316 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/10848770.2019.1571315 |
| OpenAlex | W2914963830 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 11 |
Shelley’s Swellfoot the Tyrant has recently begun to gain the concerted attention of critics, who have noted the play’s signature blend of low and high, of ephemeral, late Regency politics with the classic genres of Sophoclean tragedy, Aristophanic comedy, and mock epic. But Austin Warren’s famous and widely accepted definition of mock epic as “not mockery of the epic but elegantly affectionate homage, offered by a writer who finds [the serious epic] irrelevant to his age” does not describe Shelley’s earnest goal of immediate political reform in authoring Swellfoot. Instead, the play evinces Shelley’s unique, conscious reconfiguration of four conventions characteristic of the high, classical epic: the “prosperous breeze”; the epic simile; katabasis or descent into the underworld; and divine intervention. I argue that Shelley’s comic adaptation of these epic conventions reflects his serious aim of helping effect reform through Swellfoot and embodies his absorption of the concept of Shakespeare’s history plays as an experimental hybrid of dramatic forms with epic subjects, gained during his earlier reading of A. W. Schlegel’s Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature. Though the immediate suppression of Swellfoot prevented its relevance in its own historical moment, it comprises a singular hybrid of Aristophanic satire and Sophoclean tragedy with high epic conventions, while ironically also identifying Shelley as a proponent of the French neoclassical theory of the epic’s consciously didactic purpose propounded by Le Bossu
Art · EPIC · Literature · Folklore, Mythology, and Literature Studies · Historical and Literary Analyses · Philosophy · Rousseau and Enlightenment Thought
The New Princeton encyclopedia of poetry and poetics
Shelley’s Poetic Thoughts
Boileau and the Nature of Neoclassicism
The Platonism of Shelley
Greek Tragedy and the British Theatre 1660-1914
Palintonos Harmonia
The People of Aristophanes. A Sociology of Old Attic Comedy
Parabasis and Animal Choruses
Validity in Interpretation
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |