Kelsh, Aaron2013-09-052018-05-272013-05-26bibid: 8266964https://hdl.handle.net/1813/33972The Golden Ass of Apuleius is a novel with an apparent radical break in continuity between the first ten books and the eleventh. On a plausible natural reading, the first ten books, which describe the comic adventures of Lucius and contain several inset tales on themes of deception and adultery, do nothing to prepare the reader for Lucius' entry into the priesthood of Isis and the homily upon the goddess, which provide the material for the eleventh book. This literary analysis will argue for the thesis that the novel's structural and narrative unity resides in the theme of audiences and their reactions to various spectacles. On my reading, audiences in the novel act as a study of the psychology of spectatorship, and spectatorship is a metaphor for the reading experience. Storytelling, narrative, and even religion have an element of performance that the Golden Ass explores.en-USdissertation or thesis