This chapter considers the periodization of the “Second Sophistic.” Borrowing and adapting an analogy from quantum physics, it argues that we can understand the Second Sophistic both in “particulate” terms—as something with clearly defined boundaries in time and space—and as a “wave function” that ripples across space and time. In particular, the literary production of the Hellenistic near east shows striking similarities in certain respects: a concern with fictionality, self-consciousness of self-presentation, a problematization of personal identity. As in the quantum analogy, it is the configuration of the “laboratory equipment” that we use for our experiments that determines the outcome of the experiment itself.