Call for Papers for a panel at the next Annual Meeting of the American
Philological Association

The HEXAMETERS of HOMER and VERGIL
Sponsored by the Society for the Oral Reading of Greek and Latin Literature.
Organized by Andrew S. Becker, Virginia Tech.

The contemporary poet Kenneth Koch has said that poetry is language Œin
which the sound of words is raised to an importance equal to that of their
meaning, and also equal to the importance of grammar and syntax.¹  Poets and
scholars have been telling us such things for many years.  Recent
innovations in technology can enhance our ability to note and describe
aural, rhythmical, and metrical phenomena: for example, James Dee
Repertorium Homericae Poesis Hexametricum.  Other recent studies focus on
the literary significance of rhythm and meter in local contexts: for
example, Mark Edwards, Sound, Sense, and Rhythm: Listening to Greek and
Latin Poetry.  Still others serve as protreptic anthologies of verse
performed rather than read silently: for example, Clive Brooks Reading Latin
Poetry Aloud: A Practical Guide to Two Thousand Years of Verse, and several
web sites, including that of the Society for the Oral Reading of Greek and
Latin Literature (SORGLL).

We welcome abstracts that treat the sounds of the Homeric and/or the
Vergilian hexameter, including but not limited to the relationship between
sound, rhythm, meter, and sense.  Although sound need not be rhetorical to
be worth noting, those moments when it is‹those passages in which sound and
sense seem mutually supportive and interdependent‹are often the most
striking and notable.

Equally welcome are abstracts that deal with, inter alia, the linguistics of
poetic sound, rhythm, and meter; the ancient Greek and/or Roman reception
and perception of such phenomena; adaptations of or responses to the sound
of Homeric and/or Vergilian hexameters; the historical development of
scholarship on the sounds of Homer and Vergil.  And equally welcome are
papers that treat only Homer or only Vergil, as well as papers that take a
comparative perspective.  Presenters should be prepared to support their
views with oral demonstration.

Abstracts should be sent as e-mail attachments by FEBRUARY 15, 2009
to Andrew S. Becker at:
andrew.becker AT vt.edu

Abstracts must be only one page in length, and contain no indication of
authorship. In accordance with APA regulations, all abstracts for papers
will be read anonymously by three outside readers. Please follow the
instructions for the format of individual abstracts that will appear in the
APA Program Guide.