Ambiguities of War: A Narratological Commentary on Silius Italicus’ Battle of Ticinus (Sil. 4.1-479)
ISBN: 9789004522671
Platform/Publisher: BRILL / BRILL
Digital rights: Users: Unlimited; Printing: Unlimited; Download: Unlimited
Subjects: Buddhism and politics.; Diplomatic relations.; Politics and government.;

This Narratological Commentary on Silius' Battle of Ticinus lays bare the narrative form of the text by addressing numerous narratological aspects, including plot-development, focalization, space, and intertextuality. The book also focuses on the phenomenon of ambiguity with its dynamic processes of (un-)strategic production, perception, and resolution. Ambiguity is a central feature of the Punica because of the epic's constant oscillation between fact and fiction: it treats the changing fortunes of war and the tension between Rome and Carthage, which Silius translates into a moment of poetical equilibrium by his paradoxical problematization of triumph in defeat and defeat through triumph.


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