The pregnant male as myth and metaphor in classical Greek literature / David D. Leitao.

"This book traces the image of the pregnant male in Greek literature as it evolves over the course of the classical period. The image as deployed in myth and in metaphor originates as a representation of paternity and, by extension, authorship of ideas, works of art, legislation, and the like. Only later, with its reception in philosophy in the early fourth century, does it also become a way to figure and negotiate the boundary between the sexes. The book considers a number of important moments in the evolution of the image: the masculinist embryological theory of Anaxagoras of Clazomenae and other fifth century pre-Socratics; literary representations of the birth of Dionysus; the origin and functions of pregnancy as a metaphor in tragedy, comedy, and works of some Sophists; and finally the redeployment of some of these myths and metaphors in Aristophanes, W?? Assemblywomen and in Plato's Symposium and Theaetetus"-- Provided by publisher

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Print version record.

The new father of Anaxagoras: the one-seed theory of reproduction and its reception in Athenian tragedy -- The thigh birth of Dionysus: exploring legitimacy in the classical city-state -- From myth to metaphor: intellectual and poetic generation in the age of the sophists -- Blepyrus's turd-child and the birth of Athena -- The pregnant philosopher: masculine and feminine procreative styles in Plato's Symposium -- Reading Plato's midwife: Socrates and intellectual paternity in the Theaetetus.

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