Greek Heroes in and out of Hades is a study on heroism and mortality from Homer to Plato. Through systematic readings of a wide range of ancient Greek texts, Stamatia Dova offers innovative hermeneutic approaches to heroic character and a comprehensive overview of the theme of descent to the underworld in the Iliad and the Odyssey, Bacchylides 5, Plato's Symposium, and Euripides' Alcestis.

Homer’s Iliad recounts the struggles of the Greek (also: Achaean) army, led by Agamemnon, during the tenth year of their siege of Troy.1 The poem begins with a plague inflicted on the Greek camp by...