Prolepsis in Ancient Greek Narrative: Definitions, Forms and Effects

This edited volume offers the first comprehensive study of prolepsis in narratives written in ancient Greek, ranging from Homer to the late antique author Colluthus, with the inclusion of Second Temple Jewish Literature. Structuralist narratology defines prolepsis as the narration in advance of an event that takes place later in the story. The papers collected in this volume start from this approach, but move beyond it by exploring a wide range of new definitions, forms and readerly effects of prolepsis. Several contributions draw on postclassical narratological approaches and focus on cognitive aspects of reading, narrative virtuality, and readerly (un)certainty that stems from prolepses.