The Classical Plot and the Invention of Western Narrative

This is the story of how Western literature first developed its distinctive taste for the kind of tight, economical plotting still employed in modern fiction and cinema. The book shows how this taste was formed in Greco-Roman antiquity out of a series of revolutions in storytelling, centered on Homer, early tragedy, Hellenistic comedy, and the Greek love-novels of the early centuries AD. Along the way, it draws on cognitive science and current literary theory to offer a resilient yet accessible new theory of what "plot" is and how it works.

• First book-length study of 'plot'
• New accessible but powerful theory of plot, surfing the new wave of theory bridging the gap between literary criticism and cognitive science
• Special studies of Homer, tragedy, New Comedy and the Greek novel offer new insights into the fundamental narrative poetics of each, backed up with detailed analysis