Pindar, the “eagle of Thebes,” as the English poet Thomas Gray called him, is archetypally regarded as the poet of the Sublime—swooping down from the heavens with language as his wings and visions of eternity as his inspiration. In this study, Robert Fowler explores the ways in which the concept of the Sublime can guide our reading of the work of one of the most important ancient Greek lyric poets. Drawing on both ancient and modern treatments of the Sublime, particularly that of Friedrich Hölderlin (1770–1843), widely regarded as Pindar’s most important modern reader, Fowler argues that Pindar’s odes should be appreciated aesthetically as literature.

Building on recent trends in criticism, the author moves away from the poems’ original performance context and the orality of ancient Greek culture, focusing instead on the reception and experience of Pindar’s odes as texts. This shift in emphasis opens the way for a fresh and multilayered examination of Pindar’s remarkable artistry, including the relationship between the poems and the occasions for which they were composed, their performative dimension, the poet’s persona, imagery, and myths. An exploration of Pindar’s views on divinity, transcendence, time, and the limits of language reveals not only a great writer, but also a great thinker.