What merit should we find in Heliodoros' novel? Towards its end Hydaspes, agonizing over whether to save Charikleia from human sacrifice, sees before him an internal audience stirred by πθη equal to his and ‘weeping through pleasure and pity at Fortune's stage-management’. This is a popular audience, a demos, evincing a popular reaction, but one which Heliodoros anticipated and doubtless welcomed. Their reaction is characterized by simple, direct emotions and some limited awareness of the larger processes that have been going (...) on in this novel. For them this is a world of τχη and amazement. Does the novel invite any deeper critical reaction than this? (shrink)