Talk:Second Sophistic

message: I'll expand this pretty soon.--NeroDrusus 15:09, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

message: First of all, I think that this article presents itself very well. It seems to be well written and is up to par with wikipedia standards. Considering that alot of people might have never heard of this topic (I know I havent anyway), I think that you did a good job in the opening paragraph of defining what second sophistic actually is. This article also seems that it would be extremely beneficial to someone that is familiar with the topic. I say this because you provide a tremendous amount of information. You not only provide an introduction of second sophistic, but you also provide their views and corresponding literature. This allows the reader to gain a greater understanding of the topic from various perspectives. One of the most important things that I think you did in relation to this is you provided writers of the second sophistic. I think this is very important for people who are not familiar with the subject. The reader might develop a greater appreciation and interest in the topic if they recognize one of the writers/members. I also think that you did a good job of avoiding any bias. Even though most of the information deals with facts, you still did a good job of not expressing your opinion. This is important in upholding the legitimacy of the information. 
Although I think you did a good job of breaking the article up into different sections/headings, I think that you maybe could break it down a little further. In addition to what the previous reviewer stated, this information is so dense and overwhelming that it needs to be broken up a little bit. Considering that huge chunks of text might be intimidating for a quick reader (someone that skims the page for information), it would definitely be beneficial to break the lengthy paragraphs down. This is evident under the heading "what is the nature of the sophists." I think it would look more appealing to the reader if the information was broken down into subheadings. 
In terms of the resources, I think that the amount of information is fairly equivalent to the number of resources used. Considering that this article is still under construction and you will most likely be adding to it, more resources will have to be utilized. Here is another internet resource that gives some additional information about the ideals of people associated with this movement: http://www.livius.org/so-st/sophistic/second_sophistic.html.Skinfan8 (talk) 00:31, 8 April 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: REVIEW

message: 6 November 2010
Generally speaking I agree that this is a not a bad article.  Certainly Wikipedia needs something on Second Sophistic.  However the introduction is focussed too much on Romans and their respect for the Greeks.  Most of this is irrelevant.  Most modern scholars who talk about 'the Second Sophistic' talk about the phenomenon in terms of Greek literature under the Roman Empire, not about Roman responses to the Greeks.  This is probably an error or oversight, but there we go.  As it currently stands the article is much too focussed on Romans and their appreciation of the wonderful Greeks - 146 BC is not an important date in Second Sophistic.  The ancient Greeks were indeed wonderful but this reads like a biased Greek nationalist view of the Second Sophistic and therefore it kind of misses the point.
What I would propose is something on the following lines:
The 'Second Sophistic' is a literary-historical term used with varying degrees of specificity (cf. P. A. Brunt, 'The Bubble of the Second Sophistic' BICS 39 (1994), 25-52). It refers most pertinently to the Greek showpiece orators who flourished from the reign of Nero until c.230 CE and who were catalogued and celebrated by the Severan writer Philostratus in his Lives of the Sophists (481); indeed Philostratus coined the term
Apart from a couple of individual speeches of Marcus Antonius Polemon of Laodicea, and, probably, of others, the work of only one of Philostratus' sophists, Aelius Aristides, survives (Dio of Prusa was a 'philosopher-sophist' apparently not trivial enough to be a complete sophist). The millionaire and benefactor Herodes Atticus is another important representative [cf. Bryn Mawr Classical Review 97.5.10 of Tom L. Kokolakis, "The Personality of Herodes Atticus," by Jennifer Tobin, Bilkent University, Ankara]. However, the 'movement' was so dominant in Greek intellectual culture that its influence can be found not only in orators, but in almost all the prose-writers of the great efflorescence of Greek literature at this time, even among the writers of 'novels' (erotikoi logoi lit. 'love-tales')
The most characteristic feature is a preoccupation with the world of Classical Athens, or, at least, with the Greek world before the Romans. Many authors tried to write and even, apparently, to speak, using the forms and vocabulary of the Attic dialect of half a millennium earlier, a practice (or an anxiety) known as 'Atticism'. By the end of the second century there were rival camps, bitterly opposed, of extreme Atticists who would exclude anything which was not paralleled in Plato or Lysias, and moderates, whose definition of Atticism was broader and whose policing of the language was more relaxed.
If style and language were often fossilized, the content and form of Greek literature after Nero are novel and diverse. Among the speeches are eulogies, e.g. of Rome and its emperors, denunciations of entire cities for particular vices, and speeches which affected to have been written on the occasion of great moments in Greek history, on the occasion of the battle of Marathon etc.  Occasionally, they would even address important local issues of contemporary relevance
In his Sacred Tales, Aristides wrote about his relationship with the healing-god Asclepius and described the dreams sent to him by the divinity. Pausanias (2) wrote what has been described as a tour-guide to the treasures of Greece, and indeed, description of scenes depicted in works of art (ekphrasis), or simply of scenes, has been identified as a typical feature of Greek literature in this period. Lucian of Samosata (Bibliografie, cf. David Konstan's select bibliography) wrote not only epideictic speeches, but satires, dialogues and miscellaneous essays. His lack of earnestness is another quintessential feature of the Second Sophistic, although this feature is not always obvious in other authors and does not necessarily, even in Lucian's oeuvre, imply an amusing read. All of which applies to Athenaeus from Naucratis in Egypt who wrote around 200CE a very long antiquarian dialogue concerned with the lifestyle of Classical and Hellenistic Greeks and the words they used to describe it.
Any comments welcomed...
Mens Sana (talk) 17:26, 6 November 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  '''A further Comment'''