Category: Classicists

Classicists in the News

~ David Meadows ~ rogueclassicist ~ Leave a comment

Another bit of catching up …

Sally Knights has put together a new GCSE textbook on Classical Civilization:

The secret life of Randall McNeill:

An interview with John Prevas (and Steve Forbes) about their book, Power, Ambition, Glory:

An interview with Sarah Ruden about her Aeneid translation:

Anthony Snodgrass received an honourary degree from UChicago:

Stephen Dyson is a prestigious fellow:

Art Robson apparently acquired a plurality of statuseseses (?):

Katharina Volk is the new editrix of TAPA:

A nice feature on Anton Bammer and his work at Ephesus:

Several St Olaf College students won awards:

Not precisely a Classicist, but architecture instructor Dean Abernathy has an interesting ‘Classical’ project involving Google Earth:

… and we were somewhat intrigued by this passing mention in Rowan Pelling’s Q&A column in the Mail, inter alia:

A married male friend has regular lunches with a beautiful, flamehaired classicist to discuss Hannibal, Herodotus and the like. Clearly, lunches that are centred on emotional exchanges are rather different from those that concern hobbies.

… that’s about as gossipy as I get … do with it what you will

Classicists in the News

~ David Meadows ~ rogueclassicist ~ Leave a comment

Congratulations to Caroline Lawrence for winning the Classical Association’s 2009 Prize:

… and to Laurier’s Judith Fletcher, who is only the second Canadian to win the AJP’s Gildersleeve Prize:

… and to Carl Huffman, who was among the recipients of the University Professor Award at DePauw:

… and to Princeton’s Dennis Feeney, who is among this year’s recipients of Guggenheims:

… and to Trinity Academy’s Shannon Walker, who has won CAMWS’ Manson A. Stewart Teacher Training Award:

Robert E. Wolverton has been surveying folks about ‘ugly’ and ‘pretty’ words:

The Daily Targum had a nice feature on T. Corey Brennan’s punk roots:

Breviaria 04/04/09

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Assorted items which have caught my eye of late:

The headline says it all:

Some sort of 3d modelling project for the Acropolis was recently undertaken:

We linked to several of Suzan Mazur’s posts relating to Robert Hecht and Marion True a few years ago … her (excellent) articles are apparently now part of some Harvard Law syllabus:

The latest issue of the American Journal of Archaeology is out, with a number of online articles of interest available:

Short item on the Classical Studies Club at the College of New Jersey:

Feature on an historical reenactment group based in Rome called SPQR:

Bulgarian coverage of the recent returns by of a couple of thousand of purloined items from Bulgaria (includes a small slide show of various items):

The Classics folks at Warwick are venturing into the world of podcasting … here’s the first (I’ll hopefully get a chance to listen to it and review it in the near future):

The latest installment of Dear Socrates at Philosophy Now (I still don’t understand how there can be a viable philosophy magazine and there’s no Classics magazine on the newsstands):

Charlotte Higgins was talking about odd Classical etymologies:

The BBC had a feature on Albania trying to cash in on Butrint (and other sites):

Andrew Chugg is involved in a project to reconstruct Cleitarchus’ History of Alexander … the promo book site has a pile of interesting things (including videos and the like not necessarily connected to Cleitarchus) … worth a look:

If you haven’t downloaded the full Gnomon Bibliographical Databank yet:

Discovery News’ Jennifer Viegas recently interviewed Rachel Havrelock about the historical Jesus:

Latest from the Spoof:

More Roman Humour

~ David Meadows ~ rogueclassicist ~ 1 Comment

Mary Beard continues to make the rounds talking about ancient humour, and it appears she was asked about who she believed was the funniest Roman. She decided it was Cicero (!) and you can read the Times coverage to find out why … I’m using this as an excuse to excerpt the chunk which shows other Romans’ histohumorical quips:

A funny thing happened on the way to the amphitheatre

— The elder Crassus was said to have laughed only once in his life. What caused Crassus to crack up? The sight of a donkey eating thistles and the well-known saying that came to mind: “Thistles are like lettuce to the lips of a donkey”

— In the middle of the Civil War the exasperated Pompey is reputed to have said of his reluctant ally Cicero: “I wish to goodness Cicero would go over to the enemy, then he would learn to fear us”

— A man leaving the Roman theatre was asked by another whether he had seen the play. “No, stupid,” he replied. “I was playing ball in the orchestra”

— Gaius Memmius, the tribune of 111BC, was said to have had taken a bite out of the arm of a man called Largus, as they were tussling over the affections of a woman.

— Crassus claimed that all over the town of Terracina the letters MMLLL were pasted up on the walls: “Mordacious Memmius Lacerates Largus’ Limb”

— A joke made to a one-eyed man, Gaius Sextius: “I shall dine with you my friend, for I see you’ve got a place for another one.” “This,” said Cicero, “is the unacceptable joke of a scurra [professional clown] both because it was unprovoked, and because it could be used against any one-eyed individual”

— Cicero was defending his client Milo on the charge of murdering the infamous Clodius in 52 BC and was under interrogation from the prosecution. The case was going to hinge on exact timing. When did Clodius die, they asked him. And here is the joke, the one that is, on its own, enough to justify the whole category of double entendres: Cicero replied with just one word, sero. The pun is on the two senses of sero: both “late” and “too late”. Clodius died late in the day, and he should have been got rid of years before.

In a related item, Charlotte Higgins ponders whether Cicero is actually worthy of our praise:

See also/cf. (from May of last year … a piece by Dr Beard for the Times):

Classicists in the News 04/04/09

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Richard Martin’s approach to Homer was the subject of a press release from UWSTL:

Michael Halleran is now provost at William and Mary: