"Analyzing the theme, provenance, and history of the Vatican Laocoon, Richard Brilliant traces the interpretation of this masterpiece of Greco-Roman sculpture through the ages, showing how these interpretations have shaped its reception. Several Laocoons are identified in this study: the alleged lost "Greek original"; the extant marbles sculpted in the first century; the sixteenth-century restoration and its affect; the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century topos of critical judgment; and the twentieth-century re-restored artifact of ancient art. Yet the Vatican Laocoon contains all of these versions in its obdurate self, and My Laocoon treats their history as a means of demonstrating an artwork's power to transcend its critical reception." "Brilliant tells the Laocoon story with wit and crudition, and his selection of illustrations demonstrates the influence that this work has exerted over the centuries."--BOOK JACKET.