Customer Reviews

Homosexuality in Greece and Rome: A Sourcebook of Basic Documents

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Thomas Hubbard has produced the most significant anthology about Greek and Roman homosexuality ever. I had wanted to do such a book twenty years ago, but I lacked the skill. A master of the Greek tongue, he found the best translations of texts often misunderstood or bowdlerized, and when he couldn't find any, he translated them himself or commissioned others to do so. He additionally placed extensive and erudite introductions along with very useful bibliographic notes at the beginning of each of chapter. Each chapter is well footnoted, and as Hubbard says in his preface, "The footnotes are geared to a general undergraduate audience that has little previous knowledge of classical civilization and may need explanation of basic cultural artifacts or historical references. The notes also include points of interpretation, which should interest both the general and the more knowledgeable reader."

He effectively demolished the absurdities of John Boswell and David Halperin, and criticized the less reprehensible but still erroneous theses of Dover and Foucault. True, Hubbard did not do much with lesbianism, but then it didn't appear often in the sources. His subtle but devastating attacks on social constructionists, extreme feminists, lesbiterians, and Socarides, the other (dying-off) old-time American Freudians, and the child abuse industry make his work not only intellectually unassailable but socially and legally relevant. It is the first of its kind and will not conceivably be surpassed. Reviewers and others may over time be able to add a few items or even quibble a bit with the translations offered. It is plausible, at the most, that a second edition may be needed in a decade or two.

It is a long book but it is so skilfully written that the reader looks forward to the next page! It is broken up with little stories, poems, arguments and anecdotes from famous names and not so famous names all in different stages of wooing a boy.

It is interesting to read about Socrates, Plato and poems from ordinary men trying to woo their love interest. Some successfully..other poems show the anger with the boy or the loss of his love.

There are wonderful arguments and debates regardinge the erastes/eromenus relationship. There are anecdotes about cross-dressers, lesbians, male prostitutes, lesbians (not so much) and spurned lovers. There are lessons on how to be successful courting a boy...what to look for and what to expect. Only families of the wealthy allowed their boys to be courted.

There were many rules of courtship and in this world the boys' virtue is protected by the father until he approves of the suitor..or the boy accepts.

The descriptions of where men can meet boys: the gymnasia, the baths, and sleeping outside a potential lovers door!

The poetry is some of the most beautiful I have ever read.

So much information but easy to digest. So much was uncovered (excuse the pun)

It was wonderful to read actual notes and speeches from Socrates,Plato and others. It provided a vivid snapshot of male love in Ancient times.

This is an exhaustive, absolutely fascinating compendium of a vast number of ancient texts, all of which make reference to classical attitudes concerning homosexuality. The array is fascinating, the conclusions myriad. For anyone who really wants to get down the the nitty gritty of ancient opinions -- or to see what day to day ancient life was like -- this book is indispensible.