- Lyric And Elegiac Poetry
(By Ewen Bowie)Only of hexameter poetry have we examples earlier than 700 B.C. But many genres first known to us
from the seventh century were certainly thriving long before - that century gives us our first elegiac,
iambic, and melic poetry because by then writing was spreading, so that the works of celebrated poets
could be recorded as those of their predecessors could not. Of our genres only elegiac significantly
exploited those formulaic phrases which both aided the composition and recitation of epic and contributed
to its oral preservation. Furthermore much of our poetry was composed with particular audiences and
occasions in view, so that incentives to preserve it orally were fewer.
Also different from epic is the prominence given to the personality of the poet or singer. The first person
becomes the focus of attention, and 'I' (occasionally 'we') tell of 'my' loves, griefs, hates, and adventures.
This has sometimes misled scholars into seeing the seventh century as an efflorescence of individualism.
Not only, however, did such poetry exist earlier, but the 'I' of a poem cannot unquestioningly be referred
to the person of the singer or poet. As traditional folk-songs and modern popular songs show, 'I'-songs can
be sung with feeling by many other than their composers. Rarely do we take such statements as
autobiographical; sometimes indeed no composer is known. Hence we should hesitate to use fragments of
such poets as Archilochus to ascribe strident self-assertion or to reconstruct biography.
Three more preliminaries. First, although what survives is ascribed to a few dozen figures, the genres
exemplified, and many conventional themes and approaches, will have been attempted by hundreds over
the Greek world. Most of our poetry was not, like epic, the virtuoso's preserve, but was designed for
occasions where amateurs contributed. This is clearest in the tradition about after-dinner singing at
Athens: a myrtle branch circulated, and with it the obligation to sing. The songs, Attic skolia, were short
and simple; and some drew a distinction between these and songs sung by the 'more talented'. This relates
to only one city, but much early poetry is designed for similar occasions, and we should not imagine
soirees at which only one virtuoso sang while other people listened or chatted.
Second, relative importance of text and accompaniment. Melic and elegiac poetry was sung, usually
accompanied respectively on the lyre and the aulos (an oboe-like wind instrument). For no song can we
reconstruct the vocal or instrumental line, and indeed we have only a rudimentary understanding of what
it might have been like. In many songs music may have contributed more to initial impact than text, in
many more it was an integral part of the effect. Doubtless I the texts selected for copying and transmission
were those whose words were of greater moment than music: but never forget that, even reading these
poems aloud, we gain access only to part of their intended effect, and before impugning deficiency of
thought or skill, ponder whether modern song-writers would gladly be judged on 'lyrics' alone.
Third, the work of almost all these poets has survived only in shattered fragments, preserved by later
quotation or on papyri recovered from Graeco-Roman Egypt. We have a few dozen elegiac poems
arguably complete, but of melic poets other than Pindar and Bacchylides only half a dozen complete