| Abstrakt: |
The following paper undertakes a critical review and examination of the various attempts over the last century and a half of scholarship in Classical Philology to categorize that most singular work of Horace, the Ars poetica. Commentators and critics of the poem have endeavoured to include the work of the Augustan poet within various pre-determined -- somewhat tendentious -- generic categories, including: the didactic treatise, the verse letter, the literary epistle, the didactic poem, and the sermo. Through critiquing these approaches I shall argue that the Ars, whether through form or subject, manages to subvert the criteria of these generic boundaries, and locates itself within a unique territory. Apart from addressing the problems involved in classifying the Ars, this paper also tackles some other general concerns of generic analysis in Classical Philology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
