The East Face of Helicon: West Asiatic Elements in Greek Poetry and Myth (Clarendon Paperbacks)

Excellent book ! One of the few on the topic.

The East Face of Helicon by the consummate Classicist Martin West is a the last word on the influence of Ancient Near Eastern Literature on early Greek poetry, myth, and drama. It supports to a large extent Martin Bernal's Black Athena at least as regards the influence of older Western Semitic literary motifs and archetypes on Greek literature. It does not raise the issue of Egyptian influence which dominates Bernal's work. Martin Bernal's three volume Black Athena is synthetic and much more speculative dealing with a preponderance of evidence, whereas Martin West's approach is focused, analytic, and displays Greek types against Assyrian, Babylonian, Hittite, Uartian, and Hebrew literary archetypes in an organized manner. They do quote each other, however. West displays his evidence for the reader without trying to show or even hypothecate mechanisms of transmission as does Bernal. Martin West's East Face of Helicon is an elegant and persuasive work.Prof. P.C. Patton, Ph.D.Ancient Near Eastern Studies

Print on demand reproduction is a bit fuzzy for the price