Euripides, "Alexandros"

This is the first full-scale commentary on Euripides’ Alexandros, which is one of the best preserved fragmentary tragedies. It yields insight into aspects of Euripidean style, ideology and dramatic technique (e.g. rhetoric, stagecraft and imagery) and addresses textual and philological matters, on the basis of a re-inspection of the papyrus fragments. This book offers a reconstruction of the play and an investigation of issues of characterization, staging, textual transmission and reception, not least because Alexandros has enjoyed a fascinating Nachleben in literary, dramaturgical and performative terms. It also contributes to the readers’ understanding of the trends of later Euripidean drama, especially the dramatist’s innovation and experimentation with plot-patterns and staging conventions. Furthermore, the analysis of Alexandros could stimulate a more comprehensive reading of the extant Trojan Women coming from the same production, which bears the features of a ‘connected trilogy’. Thus, the information retrieved through the interrogation of the rich fragmentary material serves to supplement and contextualize the extant tragic corpus, showcasing the vitality and multiformity of Euripidean drama as a whole.      

Ioanna Karamanou, University of the Peloponnese, Nafplio, Greece.

"[...] Karamanou’s work [...] should become a prime resource for future studies of Alexandros."
Martin Cropp in: Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2018.09.56

"The author is to be warmly congratulated on producing what will surely take its place as the book on which all future work on this play will be based. As always with de Gruyter, production values are impeccable."
Colin Leach in: Classics for All, 10.01.2018, https://classicsforall.org.uk/book-reviews/euripides-alexandros-introduction-text-commentary/

"As a whole, that volume is a model for how this kind of book should be done, and Karamanou can take pride in her achievement."
P. J. Finglass in: Gnomon 91 (2019), 267-268

"K. has produced an essential resource for future work on Euripides’ fragmentary Alexandros [...]"
Florence Yoon in: The Classical Review 69.1 (2019); 31-33