This vocabulary serves the systematic recording of recurring motifs, topics, plots, persons or characters, places, rhetorical topoi, and referenced works in the literary reception of Sappho from antiquity to the present.
The definitions and notes on the individual concepts are machine-translated from German.
Definition: Motif [from Med. Lat. motivus = moving], generally: the motivating cause of a human attitude or action; in literary and art studies: the material-thematic, situation-bound element whose basic content can be described schematically, e.g. the motif — linked to many historical subjects — of the love triangle, the unrecognized returnee, the doppelgänger, the hostile brother, the type-motif of the loner, the bohemian, etc.; the space- and time-motif of the ruin, the race against time, the visit to the underworld, recognition (anagnorisis), etc. Unlike subject matter (Stoff), it has no continuity of action, no fixation on persons, and no narratable substantive course. (Heike Gfrereis (ed.): Grundbegriffe der Literaturwissenschaft. Stuttgart/Weimar: Metzler 1999, p. 130)
Places encompasses both fictive spaces (e.g. the underworld) and real settings (e.g. Greece).
Persons encompasses both real and fictive figures. The real ones include ancient personalities such as Alcaeus or Sappho herself, as well as people from her circle, such as her father Scamandronymus. Other historical figures are also included, for example Francesco Petrarca. Fictive persons include divine figures and personifications such as Adonis, mythological figures such as Narcissus, Olympian gods such as Aphrodite, as well as figures from Sappho’s circle, such as Atthis. In addition, there are literary figures such as Petrarch’s Laura. Beyond this, types are also recorded that denote particular social, mythological, religious, or societal roles, such as slave, muse, priest/priestess, and bride/bridegroom.
Definition: Topos, pl. topoi [Gr. place, commonplace, Lat. locus communis], 1. in ancient rhetoric: lines of questioning and search formulas that facilitate the finding of arguments […], 2. generally: any traditional scheme of thought and expression, especially any element of »life as captured and shaped in literature« (E.R. Curtius), e.g. quotations, stereotypical turns of phrase, formulas, metaphors, emblems, motifs […], subject matter, descriptive patterns […], structural schemes […], literary genres. Its function depends in each case on the individual work, the genre, the purpose of the speech, and the specific historical context. (Heike Gfrereis (ed.): Grundbegriffe der Literaturwissenschaft. Stuttgart/Weimar: Metzler 1999, p. 209)
Definition: Subject matter (Stoff), the action that can be extracted from a literary work, the ordering of the individual particles of event (e.g. encounter/separation/reunion) in their logical, chronological, and psychological sequence: the Faust material, the Amphitryon material, the Don Juan material, the Julius Caesar material, etc. Always already shaped in a particular way, never raw material, never mere matter in itself; often traces back to so-called primal materials, in which, for example, certain archetypal patterns of action and behaviour (such as the Oedipal constellation, the generational conflict) or conflicts between differing worldviews (idealism–materialism; rationalism–irrationalism, among others) are worked through by means of a narrative with concrete characters, a chain of events arranged in a particular way, a specific situational setting, etc. Important sources of subject matter besides individual literary texts: history, ancient mythology, and the Bible. The origin, genesis, and transformations (stylization, trivialization, etc.) of subject matter transmitted and reworked many times over in literature are studied by the history of subject matter, thematology. In Russian Formalism usually termed fabula, in Anglo-American literary studies plot, in French histoire, in Aristotle’s Poetics mythos; usually arranged by the individual literary work in a different logical, chronological, and psychological sequence (sujet, story, discourse). (Heike Gfrereis (ed.): Grundbegriffe der Literaturwissenschaft. Stuttgart/Weimar: Metzler 1999, p. 195)
Here, subject matter is primarily understood as biographical narratives relating to Sappho and her immediate circle; alongside Sappho herself, her brother Charaxos is of particular significance.
Definition: Topic [Gr. that which is set forth], a frequently used yet contested term in literary studies, generally: the subject of conversation, the object of a speech or a written text; establishes a connection (textuality) between the particulars of subject matter and motif and links them to extra-literary spheres of experience and imagination; but also used synonymously with subject matter or motif. (Heike Gfrereis (ed.): Grundbegriffe der Literaturwissenschaft. Stuttgart/Weimar: Metzler 1999, p. 208)
Both literary texts and scholarly works are recorded.