A major theme of the Dionysiaca is the voyeur or curious seeker, whose search, often eroticized, for new experience or knowledge is in various ways rewarding or endangering.

Aeschylus evokes, sometimes literally and sometimes metaphorically, the elements and their interactions in ways that show his knowledge of the ideas of Parmenides and Empedocles.

Analysis of the trial scenes in Chariton, Longus, and Achilles Tatius shows their knowledge and use of the full repertory of rhetorical theory concerned with designing the strategy of forensic arguments.