Our Open House series of 2016 started with a visit from Jacqueline Vayntrub, who is NECL Post-Doctoral Fellow at Harvard, 2015–2016, as the visiting scholar. The discussion topic was The Epic of Gilgamesh, with the focus on ‘The Search for Everlasting Life’ (section 4 in the edition linked). Bitterly Gilgamesh wept for his friend Enkidu; he wandered over the wilderness as a hunter, he roamed over the plains; in his… Read more
“The poetry of Virgil, I take it as a given, rivals that of Homer. Historically, Virgil the Classic even displaced Homer the Classic in the Latin culture of the Roman empire (though not in the Greek) – already in the age of Virgil. But the question is: what is it exactly about the poetry of Virgil that made it rival the poetry of Homer in the first place – not… Read more
We were delighted to welcome Olga M. Davidson for an Open House discussion when she talked about why she began studying Homeric epic but went on to study the Shāhnāma of Ferdowsi and its poetic world. About her book Poet and Hero in the Persian Book of Kings: Olga M. Davidson argues that….whenever the Shāhnāma was performed by the poet or by later practitioners of his poetry, the performer could… Read more
We were pleased to welcome back Joel Christensen (University of Texas, San Antonio) for our Open House discussion, when we were talking about ‘Epos and Eris: Composition, Competition and the ‘Domestication’ of Strife’, which was originally given as a keynote talk at the 2015 Heartland Graduate Workshop in Ancient Studies. To prepare for the discussion, participants might like to read the paper, which is available at Acadameia.edu, here. The abstract introduces the… Read more
We were pleased to welcome back Professor Olga Levaniouk (University of Washington) for an Open House discussion on “The dreams of Barchin and Penelope.” The webcast was recorded and can be viewed below, or you can watch on our YouTube channel. To prepare for this conversation, participants might like to read Olga Levaniouk’s Eve of the Festival Chapter 13, “The Dream.” Featured in the video was Olga Levaniouk’s translation of… Read more