Professor Joel Christensen visited our community to discuss the Odyssey and Breaking Bad. He also studies a wide range of topics including modern science fiction.
We are pleased to share the following video from Classics Confidential where he talks about the epic future, myth, and science fiction.
This video also features Elton Barker, a scholar with whom Professor Christensen has collaborated on several occasions. Barker and Christensen have authored a book Homer: A Beginners Guide.
Widely revered as the father of Western literature, Homer was the author of The Iliad and The Odyssey, the epic poems which immortalised such names as Cyclops, Menelaus, and Achilles, and inspired such films as the Brad Pitt blockbuster Troy. In this vivid introduction, Elton Barker and Joel Christensen celebrate the complexity, innovation and sheer excitement of Homer’s two great works, and investigate the controversy surrounding the man behind the myths – asking who he was and whether he even existed.
From soap operas to Salman Rushdie, the authors also highlight just how much we owe Homer and why he has been so influential. Perfect for new readers of the great poet but full of insights that will delight Homeric experts, it will inspire you to discover (or rediscover) his epic masterpieces first-hand.
They have also co-authored several articles including the following, which is available online:
“Oedipus of Many Pains: Strategies of Contest in the Homeric Poems.” Leeds International Classical Studies 7.2 (2008).