Introduction by Jonas Grethlein: 

Ancient critics frequently use the term oikonomia for the plot of narratives. At first sight, oikonomia refers to the arrangement of the material in purely formal terms, but upon closer inspection it provides an intriguing instance of the entwinement of aesthetics with ethics in ancient criticism: As I will try to show, oikonomia can be ethically charged, often along the lines of literal oikonomia, the art of estate management.

I will first discuss scholia in which oikonomia and its derivatives go beyond a formalist designation of order. Then I will argue that the ethical dimension of oikonomia can also be detected in the essays of Dionysius of Halicarnassus, particularly in his analysis of Thucydides.

Conversely, a brief look at Xenophon’s Oeconomicus will reveal that the discourse of how to administer an οἶκος also refers to narrative. In the conclusion, I will briefly point to the entwinement of narrative with divine arrangement in the uses of oikonomia by early Christian authors.

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