Persuasion, Emotion, and the Letters of the Alexander Romance
Abstract
The Greek Alexander Romance includes over thirty letters embedded within its narrative framework. This article reexamines the letters through the lens of three generic categories: documentary, ethopoetic, and miracle letters. These categories are derived through comparison with the characteristics of non-literary letters in Hellenistic and Imperial papyri. I demonstrate that these three types of letters activate different horizons of expectation in the reader and engage the audience as participants in Alexander's narrative.
Jacqueline Arthur-Montagne is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Classics at Stanford University. Her research interests include the ancient novel, literature of the Second Sophistic, and the Persian Empire. Her dissertation examines the generic tensions at play in late antique and medieval adaptations of the novels.
