A Handbook to Classical Reception in Eastern and Central Europe
Wiley Blackwell Handbooks to Classical Reception Series

• A Handbook to Classical Reception in Eastern and Central Europe is the first comprehensive English]language study of the reception of classical antiquity in Eastern and Central Europe. This groundbreaking work offers detailed case studies of thirteen countries that are fully contextualized historically, locally, and regionally.
• The first English-language collection of  research and scholarship on Greco-Roman heritage in Eastern and Central Europe 
• Written and edited by an international group of seasoned and up-and-coming scholars with vast subject-matter experience and expertise 
• Essays from leading scholars in the field provide broad insight into the reception of the classical world within specific cultural and geographical areas 
• Discusses the reception of many aspects of Greco-Roman heritage, such as prose/philosophy, poetry, material culture
• Offers broad and significant insights into the complicated engagement many countries of Eastern and Central Europe have had and continue to have with Greco-Roman antiquity

List of Illustrations x

Notes on Contributors xii

Acknowledgments xix

Introduction 1
Zara Martirosova Torlone, Dana LaCourse Munteanu, and Dorota Dutsch

Part I Croatia 13
Neven Jovanovic ́

1 Classical Reception in Croatia: An Introduction 15
Neven Jovanovic ́

2 Pula and Split: The Early Modern Tale(s) of Two Ancient Cities 21
Jasenka Gudelj

3 Croatian Neo‐Latin Literature and Its Uses 35
Neven Jovanović

4 The First Dalmatian Humanists and the Classics: A Manuscript Perspective 46
Luka Špoljarić

5 The Swan Song of the Latin Homer 57
Petra Šoštarić

Part II Slovenia 67
Marko Marinčič

6 Classical Reception in Slovenia: An Introduction 69
Marko Marinčič

7 Collecting Roman Inscriptions Beyond the Alps: Augustinus Tyfernus 74
Marjeta Šašel Kos

8 Sta. Maria sopra Siwa: Inventing a Slavic Venus 88
Marko Marincǐ č

9 Images from Slovenian Dramatic and Theatrical Interpretations of Ancient Drama 99
Andreja N. Inkret

Part III Czech Republic 113
Jan Bažant

10 Classical Reception in the Czech Republic: An Introduction 115
Jan Bažant

11 Classical Antiquity in Czech Literature between the National Revival and the Avant‐Garde 121
Daniela Čadkova

12 The Classical Tradition and Nationalism: The Art and Architecture of Prague, 1860–1900 133
Jan Bažant

13 The Case of the Oresteia: Classical Drama on the Czech Stage, 1889–2012 146
Alena Sarkissian

Part IV Poland 159
Dorota Dutsch

14 Classical Reception in Poland: An Introduction 161
Dorota Dutsch

15 From Fictitious Letters to Celestial Revolutions: Copernicus and the Classics 166
Dorota Dutsch and Francois Zdanowicz

16 Respublica and the Language of Freedom: The Polish Experiment 179
Anna Grzesḱ owiak‐Krwawicz

17 Two Essays on Classical Reception in Poland 190
Jerzy Axer

18 Parallels between Greece and Poland in Juliusz Słowacki’s Oeuvre 207
Maria Kalinowska

Part V Hungary 223
Farkas Gabor Kiss

19 Classical Reception in Hungary: An Introduction 225
Farkas Gabor Kiss

20 Classical Reception in Sixteenth‐Century Hungarian Drama 233
Agnes Juhasz‐Ormsby

21 Truditur dies die: Reading Horace as a Political Attitude in Nineteenth‐ and Twentieth‐Century Hungary 245
Abel Tamas

22 The Shepherdess and the Myrmillo: The Sculptor Istvan Ferenczy and the Reception of Classical Antiquity in Hungary 260
Nora Veszpremi

Part VI Romania 277
Dana LaCourse Munteanu

23 Classical Reception in Romania: An Introduction 279
Radu Ardevan, Florin Berindeanu, and Ioan Piso

24 Loving Vergil, Hating Rome: Coşbuc as Translator and Poet 287
Carmen Fenechiu and Dana LaCourse Munteanu

25 Noica’s Becoming within Being and Meno’s Paradox 300
Octavian Gabor

26 Reception of the Tropaeum Traiani: Former Paths and Future Directions 312
Allison L.C. Emmerson

Part VII Bosnia‐Herzegovina, Serbia, and Montenegro 327

Nada Zečević

27 Classical Reception in Bosnia‐Herzegovina, Serbia, and Montenegro: An Introduction 329
Nada Zecě vić and Nenad Ristović

28 Classical Antiquity in the Franciscan Historiography of Bosnia (Eighteenth Century) 336
Nada Zečević

29 Innovative Impact of the Classical Tradition on Early Modern Serbian Literature 347
Nenad Ristovic ́

30 Classical Heritage in Serbian Lyric Poetry of the Twentieth Century: Jovan Dučić, Miloš Crnjanski, and Ivan V. Lalić 360
Ana Petković

31 The Ancient Sources of Njegoš’s Poetics 373
Darko Todorovic ́

Part VIII Bulgaria 387
Yoana Sirakova

32 Classical Reception in Bulgaria: An Introduction 389
Yoana Sirakova

33 Bulgarian Lands in Antiquity: A Melting Pot of Thracian, Greek, and Roman Culture 396
Mirena Slavova

34 In the Labyrinth of Allusions: Ancient Figures in Bulgarian Prose Fiction 411
Violeta Gerjikova

35 “Bulgarian” Orpheus between the National and the Foreign, between Antiquity and Postmodernism 423
Yoana Sirakova

36 Staging of Ancient Tragedies in Bulgaria and Their Influence on the Process of Translation and Creative Reception 437
Dorothea Tabakova

Part IX Russia 449
Judith E. Kalb

37 Classical Reception in Russia: An Introduction 451
Judith E. Kalb

38 “Men in Cases”: The Perception of Classical Schools in Prerevolutionary Russia 457
Grigory Starikovsky

39 Homer in Russia 469
Judith E. Kalb

40 Vergil in Russia: Milestones of Identity 480
Zara Martirosova Torlone

41 Russian Encounters with Classical Antiquities: Archaeology, Museums, and National Identity in the Tsarist Empire 493
Caspar Meyer

Part X Armenia and Georgia 507
Zara Martirosova Torlone

42 Armenian Culture and Classical Antiquity 509
Armen Kazaryan and Gohar Muradyan

43 Medieval Greek–Armenian Literary Relations 516
Gohar Muradyan

44 The “Classical” Trend of the Armenian Architectural School of Ani: The Greco‐Roman Model and the Conversion of Medieval Art 528
Armen Kazaryan

45 Classical Reception in Georgia: An Introduction 541
Ketevan Gurchiani

46 Greek Tragedy on the Georgian Stage in the Twentieth Century 548
Ketevan Gurchiani

Index 560

Advanced undergraduates, graduate students, and scholars interested in Classical Reception, specifically outside Western European canon and culture

Zara Martirosova Torlone is Professor in the Department of Classics at Miami University, USA. She is the author of Russia and the Classics (2009) and Vergil in Russia (2015), editor of Classical Reception in Eastern Europe (a special issue of Classical Receptions Journal), and co‑editor of Insiders and Outsiders in Russian Cinema (with Stephen Norris, 2008). She has written numerous articles concerning classical literature and its reception, especially in Russian culture.

Dana LaCourse Munteanu is Associate Professor in the Department of Greek and Latin at Ohio State University, Newark, USA. She is the author of Tragic Pathos: Pity and Fear in Greek Philosophy and Tragedy (2012) and the editor of Emotion, Genre and Gender in Classical Antiquity (2011). She has written several articles on Greek philosophy, tragedy and the reception.