Helen of Troy

Laurie Maguire is Professor of English at Oxford University and has authored or edited six previous books, including Studying Shakespeare and the popular Where There's a Will There's a Way. She has lectured widely at literary festivals in the U.S. and U.K.

"Overall, Maguire's book is a remarkably broad literary study of the complex and recurring figure of Helen of Troy. Her work is both comprehensive and detailed, covering a huge body of material both ancient and modern." (International Journal of the Classical Tradition, 2011) "In conclusion, this an important work, especially praiseworthy for its wide-ranging critical perspectives and admirable depth of information, and above all for its all-round literary explorations. It is also a very enjoyable read." (Bryn Mawr Classical Review, 25 March 2011)"It is an important work in the broad area of Classical Reception and it is aimed at both specialists and the general reader; and it is quite remarkable for the vast variety of information, sources and genres surveyed and for the wealth of secondary literature and critical approaches deployed." (Bmcreview, 7 March 2011)"Maguire's book is an unusually effective study of something often invoked in an airy sort of way but difficult to represent concretely and cogently: literature and related arts as an ongoing and continuously motivated enterprise, sometimes almost collective in its workings across great stretches of time." (Translation & Literature, 2010)"M.'s survey is impressively broad in scope ... .An impressive achievement." (The Classical Journal, February 2010)"Erudite and entertaining ... .We are certainly better equipped to understand the phenomenon of such a mysterious narrative lacuna by the end of Maguire's inspirational book." (The Times Literary Supplement, November 2009)“Combining wit, learning, and insight, Maguire offers delightful reading both for the specialist and for the serious general reader." (Library Journal, May 2009)

• List of Illustrations viiiPreface ixSource Acknowledgments xvConventions xviiIntroduction: Ab ovo 1Beginnings 1Stories and Contexts 2Chapter 1: Narrating Myth 10Whose Story? 10Absence 12Fragments and Narrative 15Closure 17The Textual Shudder 20Myth and Repetition 23Origins 26Myth and Meaning 28Causes 30(En)Closure 33Chapter 2: Beauty 35Excess and Deficiency 35Narrating the Absolute 39Staging the Absolute 43Detailing Helen 45The Beauty Effect 49Helen’s Breasts 52Androgyny 56Helen’s Scar 59Relativizing the Absolute 65Helen and Old Age 69Beauty: Subjectivity and Objectivity 74Beauty and Nostalgia 78Chapter 3: Abducting Helen 83Missing Moments 83Homer, the Iliad 84Herodotus, the Histories 86Chaucer and Narrative Gaps 88Helen and Cressida 93The Law’s Resolution of Women’s Rights (1632) 97Statute Change in 1597 100The Rape of Lucrece (1594) 102Helen (of Troy) 104Rape as Revenge 107Chapter 4: Blame 109Accounts 109Casting Blame: Helen, Paris, and the Gods 110Sidestepping Blame: Sympathy in the Iliad 113Competing Narratives: the Odyssey 115“Twisting Eulogy / And Censure Both Together” 116Voicing Helen: Euripides 118Helen Among the Sophists 120Agency (1): Joseph of Exeter 124Agency (2): Middle English Troy Books 126George Peele, The Tale of Troy (1589) 129Deifying Helen: John Ogle, The Lamentation of Troy (1594) 131Mimetic Desire, the Scapegoat, and Blasphemy 134Naming and Shaming 138Chapter 5: Helen and the Faust Tradition 142Form and Appearance in the English Faust Book 144Helen in the English Faust Book 147Dr Faustus and Language 150Dr Faustus and Boundaries 153Goethe (1749–1832) 154Goethe and Representation 155Goethe and the Beauty of Language 158The Face That Launched a Thousand Ships 160Jo Clifford (1950–) 164Clifford’s Helen and Gender Politics 168Chapter 6: Parodying Helen 173Comedy 174The Novel 185Caribbean Helen: Derek Walcott, Omeros (1990) 198Notes 207References 231Index 250