William Franke, On the Poetic Truth that is Higher than History: Porphyry and the Philosophical Interpretation of Literature

Abstract

In this article we propose the translation of William Franke’s paper On the Poetic Truth that is Higher than History: Porphyry and the Philosophical Criticism of Literature, in which the American scholar presents the hermeneutic method of the ancient commentators of Homer, with particular reference to the critic practice applied by the Neoplatonic Porphyry in his De Antro Nympharum. With this treatment Franke proposes and hopes for the return to an interpretive method, called philosophical or speculative, also for contemporary criticism.