Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2003. / Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 181-199). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Catholic University of America. / Bibliography: p. [5]-8.

Diss.--Hamburg. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Extract from Thesis (Ph. D.)--Johns Hopkins University, 1938. / Vita. "Reprinted from ELH, a journal of English literary history, vol. 5. no. 2. June, 1938."

Habilitationsschrift -- Universität Freiburg (Breisgau), 1992. / Includes footnotes, bibliography and indexes.

A syntagmatic analysis of the Argonauts’ encounters with the Lemnian women and the Doliones in Apollonius of Rhodius’ Argonautica Book 1. Combining intertextuality with cognitive narratology, I approach the text from the perspective of the reader. Beginning with a study of the poem’s programmatic proem before moving to a study of the Argonauts’ first encounters on their outward journey, I map the reader’s experience on their own voyage through a difficult and elliptical narrative. To tackle the demands of a densely allusive text and the manipulations of a subjective narrator, I employ a plurality of readers: the general reader is accompanied on this exploration by two fictional readers. Charting the varying interpretations of the attentive reader and the experienced reader (Homeric auditor and Homeric scholar respectively) enables me to combine investigation of text and intertexts as moderated by the narrator with analysis of the ways they modify the expectations of the reader as they progress in a linear fashion from episode to episode. By consideration of where interpretations overlap and where they differ according to what the reader brings to the text and of how the narrative conditions its readers on the journey, I demonstrate the value of the reader-orientated approach to tackling the complexities of the narrative and the demands it places on all its readers.

This report examines heroism in Apollonius’ Argonautica and argues that a different heroic model predominates in each of the first three books. Unlike Homer’s epics where Achilles with his superhuman might and Odysseus with his unparalleled cunning serve as the unifying forces for their respective poems, there is no single guiding influence in the Argonautica. Rather, each book establishes its own heroic type, distinct from the others. In Book 1, Heracles is the central figure, demonstrating his heroic worth through feats of strength and martial excellence. In Book 2, Polydeuces, the helmsmen, and—what I have called—the “Odyssean” Heracles use their mētis to guide and safeguard the expedition. And in Book 3, Jason takes center stage, a human character with human limitations tasked with an epic, impossible mission. This movement from Book 1 (Heracles and biē) to Book 2 (Polydeuces/helmsmen and mētis) to Book 3 (Jason and human realism) reflects the epic tradition: the Iliad (Achilles and biē) to the Odyssey (Odysseus and mētis) to the Argonautica (Apollonius’ epic and the Hellenistic age). Thus, the Argonautica is an epic about epic and its evolving classification of what it entails to be a hero. The final stage in this grand metaphor comes in Book 3 which mirrors the literary environment in Apollonius’ own day and age, a time invested in realism where epic had been deemed obsolete. Jason, as the representative of that Hellenistic world, is unable to successively use Iliadic or Odyssean heroics because he is as human and ordinary as Apollonius’ audience. Jason, like his readers, cannot connect to the archaic past. Medea, however, changes this when she saves Jason’s life by effectively rewriting him to become a superhuman, epic hero. She is a metaphor for Apollonius himself, a poet who wrote an epic in an unepic world. The final message of Book 3, therefore, is an affirmation not of the death of epic but its survival in the Hellenistic age. / text

Thesis (doctoral)--Rijksuniversiteit te Groningen, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references.

This thesis adopts a cognitive-phenomenological approach to Apollonius’ presentation of psychological imagery, thus eschewing the cultural-determinist assumptions that have tended to dominate Classical scholarship. To achieve this, I analyse relevant theories and results from the cognitive sciences (Theory of Mind, agency, gesture, conceptual metaphor), as well as perceived socio-literary influences from the post-Homeric tradition and the various advances (for example, medical) from contemporary Alexandria. This interdisciplinary methodology is then applied to the Argonautica in three large case studies: Medea and the simile of the sunbeam (3.755-60), Heracles and the simile of the gadfly (1.1286-72), and, finally, the poem’s overall psychological portrayal of Jason. In so doing, I show that Apollonius conforms to cognitive universal patterns of psychological expression, while also deploying and deepening his specific culture’s poetic, folk, and scientific models.

The Conics of Apollonius remains a central work of Greek mathematics to this day. Despite this, much recent scholarship has neglected the Conics in favor of works of Archimedes. While these are no less important in their own right, a full understanding of the Greek mathematical corpus cannot be bereft of systematic studies of the Conics. However, recent scholarship on Archimedes has revealed that the role of secondary commentaries is also important. In this thesis, I provide a translation of Eutocius' commentary on the Conics, demonstrating the interplay between the two works and their authors as what I call conjugate. I also give a treatment on the duplication problem and on compound ratios, topics which are tightly linked to the Conics and the rest of the Greek mathematical corpus. My discussion of the duplication problem also includes two computer programs useful for visualizing Archytas' and Eratosthenes' solutions.