Memory, the Promised Land of poets in archaic Greek melic poetry

Abstract

The immortalization of the poet through the enduring memory of song is certainly a recurrent theme in ancient Greek poetic tradition. The immaterial reign of memory, it may be said, is a kind of Promised Land for poets, as well as the path through salvation from death and, even worse, oblivion. But from oblivion and even from the inexorable death there is an escape route, so to speak, in the world of poetry, through fame that preserves the poet’s name and poems – fame that is longed for. Such is the theme of this study in which I turn to its elaborations and strategies focusing on archaic melic (or lyric) poetry, one of the most performative poetic genres in ancient Greek poetry.