Sets out the book’s critical framework and methodology. Outlines the current scholarly consensus regarding the Posthomerica and its place within imperial Greek epic. Emphasises the strong relationship between these readings and the ‘supplementary’ poetics attached to Roman, and particularly silver Latin, poetry.It then demonstrates the ways in which this book will depart from these readings. Introduces the concept of the ‘poetics of the interval’ as the key aspect of this departure: Quintus’ new formative poetics. Sets this poetics within and against various relevant traditions: pseudoepigraphia, the epic cycle, Latin literature. And sets up the political and cultural implications of this new framework: shows Quintus’ politically engaged interaction with imperial Greek performance culture,declamation and rhetoric, and other imperial Greek epic. Ends by establishing the ‘terms of engagement’: the book’s approach to key concepts such as intertextuality, allusion, postmodernism and ‘metapoetics’.