Topics vary year to year, below are some recent course descriptions:
Culture and Conquest: Greek and Roman Interactions
The Roman poet Horace famously wrote 'Captive Greece took captive her fierce conqueror and brought arts to rustic Latium' (Epistles 2.1.156-7). The aim of this course is to understand some of the interactions between Greek-speakers and Romans from their beginnings in the third century B. C. E. to the emergence of an identifiable 'Graeco-Roman' culture in the first centuries C. E.. In what ways did Greek culture come to dominate Latin literature and thought in the second and first centuries BCE? How in turn were Greek thought and literature influenced by Rome? Authors read include Polybius, Apollonius, Livy, Virgil, Catullus, and Plutarch. (J. Chaplin)
Seneca: Stoicism, Rage and Renaissance
Lucius Annaeus Seneca the Younger (c.4BCE-65CE) is a study in contrasts. Exiled by one emperor (Claudius), Seneca was tutor to another (Nero); he advocated a life of Stoic simplicity, while being one of the wealthiest men in Rome; in his philosophy he postulates an ordered universe guided by divine reason and providence, while his tragedies portray the victory of passion-driven violence and revenge. His works were often reviled as derivative and bombastic. Yet during the 16th and 17th centuries he was valued over his Greek predecessors, and in recent years there has been a radical reevaluation of his work and a proliferation of Senecan studies. This class will investigate the paradoxes that lie at the core of Seneca’s life, writings and reception. Readings will focus on his tragedies (including, Medea, Thyestes, Agamemnon and The Trojan Women) and philosophical works (especially, On Anger, On Mercy, and Moral Epistles). We will look at Seneca’s works both in their Roman context, with focus given to their possible place as part of the “New Golden Age” under Nero, and will also consider Seneca’s place as one of the most powerful classical influences on English Renaissance drama, reading select plays from Shakespeare and his contemporaries. (C. Star)
Plato's Republic
Plato's Republic is the world's most renowned book about justice in society and education in the human soul. The aim of this seminar is to study the entire book, giving attention to the details of its arguments and images while working towards an understanding of its teaching as a whole. Important interpretations of the Republic by Greek (Aristotle), Roman (Cicero), Christian (Augustine), Islamic (Alfarabi), and modern authors will be considered along with the main work of studying Plato's book ourselves. (Upperclass standing and some previous study of Plato are assumed.) (E. Adler)
Greek and Roman Religion
This course examines the religions of Greece and Rome. Drawing on literary, epigraphical, and archaeological sources, we will study the Greek and Roman views of the gods as they emerge from various myths and cult practices, especially animal sacrifice. We will explore the Greco-Roman ideas of personal salvation, but also the importance of religious festivals for the community, be it the Greek polis or the Roman state. Finally, while looking at such ancient debates as the sophistic and Platonic critiques of the traditional gods, we will consider some similarities and differences between the sacred in Greco-Roman culture and religion in our own society. (P. Sfyroeras)