The readings listed under each week should be completed by the Monday class meeting of that week. We will spread the discussion over all three class meetings of the week, but all readings will be needed to make sense of the week’s topic.
* indicates a reading that may be used for a response.
Homer, Iliad 22.405-515 (Hector dies, the Trojans lament). - In what ways are the reaction of Achilles to Patroclus' death [spoiler alert, sorry] similar to the reaction of the Trojans to Hector's death?
* Harrisson, Juliette Grace. 2016. "Shipping in Plato's Symposium." In The Classical Canon and/as Transformative Work, edited by Ika Willis, special issue, Transformative Works and Cultures 21.
Quiz #2: M 2/3 Response #2: Due F 2/7 by 11:59pm
Week 4 (2/10, 2/12, 2/14) - Greek Elegy and Lyric and the Symposium
Sappho 1, 16, 31. -- Carson, Anne (trans.). 2003. If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho. New York. - What is the dramatic situation in each of these poems? Who are the characters, and how do they relate?
Archilochus, Cologne Epode - Same questions as for Sappho: who are the characters involved, and how do they relate? What's happening in this poem?
Quiz #4: M 2/17 Response #4: Due F 2/21 by 11:59pm
Week 6 (2/24, 2/26, 2/28) - Greek Oratory and Law
Slideshow: link here
*Gorgias'Helen, 1-8 and 20-21: link here - 1) How is Helen depicted? What does this depiction imply about gender? 2) In what three ways does Gorgias 'defend' Helen?
Aeschines Against Timarchus. Read as much as you'd like (there are 196 chapters) to get a sense of Aeschines' argumentation and rhetorical style. Note what he uses as evidence or the ways in which he tries to assassinate the character of Timarchus.
* Cantarella, Eva. 2005. "Gender, Sexuality, and Law." In The Cambridge Companion to Ancient Greek Law, edited by Michael Gagarin and David Cohen, 236-253. Cambridge.
* Murray, Jackie and Jonathan M. Rowland. 2007. "Gendered Voices in Hellenistic Epigram." In Brill's Companion to Hellenistic Epigram, edited by Peter Bing and Jon Bruss, 211-232. Leiden.
Note that all due dates from this point on are suggestions rather than hard and fast deadlines: the exam and quiz links will all remain live until the end of the semester, and the upload portal will remain live as well. The only hard and fast deadlines are:
the midterm exam should be completed or the midterm essay should be uploaded to the upload portal by Friday, March 27 at 11:59pm,
midterm exam or essay revisions will be due by Wednesday, April 8, at 11:59pm (details forthcoming),
all quizzes and responses must be submitted by Wednesday, May 6 (the last day of “study period”),
and the final exam/essay and creative projects will be due by 11:59pm on Tuesday, May 12.
Do not let quizzes, responses, and creative projects pile up! It is in your best interest to try to adhere to the suggested deadlines so that the material is fresh in your mind and so that you’re not trying to juggle too many things at the same time.
Week 9 (3/23, 3/25, 3/27) - Midterm, From Greece to Rome: The Body Female and the Body Politic
Ormand 195-199 (“Women, Normal and Non-Normative”)
Livy 1.9 and 1.13 on the Rape of the Sabines (CW: rape) – How are the Sabine women portrayed in their abduction and the eventual reconciliation of the Romans and Sabines?
Livy 1.57-60 on Lucretia (use the right arrow at the top left of the passage to advance through the chapters) – How is Lucretia portrayed? How is Sextus Tarquinius portrayed?
* Kamen, Deborah and Sarah Levin-Richardson. 2015. “Lusty Ladies in the Roman Imaginary.” In Ancient Sex, edited by Ruby Blondell and Kirk Ormand, 231-252. Columbus.
* Williams, Craig. 1999. “Sexual Roles and Identities.” In Roman Homosexuality: Ideologies of Masculinity in Classical Antiquity, 160-224. New York and Oxford.
Ovid Ars Amatoria 1.1-772 (Francese, Christopher and R. Scott Smith, eds. 2014. Ancient Rome: An Anthology of Sources, 227-248. Indianapolis and Cambridge.)