The poeta–amator persists

Abstract

This chapter considers the opening run of poems (3.1–5) as a cohesive programmatic group that establishes Propertius’ continued treatment of his amatory discourse through close intratextual engagement with his own earlier elegies. The elegist’s positioning of his verse in relation to the poems of Callimachus and Philitas is also explored, as well as his poetry’s engagement with the contemporary works of Horace (Odes) and Vergil (Georgics, Aeneid). A close reading of 2.34 is followed by a detailed discussion of the Hellenistic background to 3.1 and 3.3 that also considers the rôle of these poems in defining Propertius’ oeuvre against those of his contemporaries. The treatment of 3.2 continues the discussion of Propertius’ interaction with Horace’s lyric poetry and the elegist’s interest in his place in posterity. Discussion of 3.4, 3.5, and 3.7 explore Propertius’ poetological use of the militia amoris and his treatment of the Gallus fragment.