Tag: Ancient Greece
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Funding the Arts in Ancient Athens
The Dionysia, a festival in ancient Athens on honour of the god Dionysus, featured plays sponsored by choregoi: wealthy citizens who financed the performance in exchange for social prestige. Fiona MacRae explores how the benefaction model of ancient Athens might be the key to saving the performing arts today.
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The Soul from Homer to Heraclitus
As Greek philosophy emerged during the sixth century BCE, so too did a swelling interest in explaining the soul. Eleonora Soteriou discusses the work of Presocratic philosophers who, building upon the earliest Homeric theories, have sought to conceptualise the immaterial.
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Review: The Penelopiad, Margaret Atwood (2005)
Written by Fiona Macrae. Published as part of the Canongate Myth Series, Margaret Atwood’s 2005 novella, ‘The Penelopiad’, recounts the events of the ‘Odyssey’ from the perspective of Penelope. Fiona Macrae discusses how Atwood’s play on the conventions of Greek epic poetry creates a more nuanced female protagonist.
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Remembrance in Fifth-Century Athens
Written by Fiona Macrae. The wearing of a poppy has become an important symbol for remembering those who gave their lives in battle. Fiona Macrae explores such acts of commemoration in Classical Athens and what parallels can be drawn with our own society.
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The Dark Earth: Hittite Influences on Sapphic poetry
Written by Etta Coleman. Although Sappho’s lyric poetry continues to receive a great deal of attention from scholars, remarkably little about her Eastern influences has been discussed. Etta Coleman explores the manner in which Hittite culture permeates Sappho’s work.
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Dido’s Lament: A Study of Dido’s Final Words
Written by Fiona Macrae. The legendary founder of Carthage, Dido has captured imaginations for a millennium. Here, her final words are explored in their many incarnations, from Virgil, to Ovid, to Purcell.
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All that Glitters is Gold: Museology and the Mask of Agamemnon
Written by Tristan Craig. The excavations of Mycenae from 1876 have been the subject of controversy for over a hundred years. A so-called ‘Mask of Agamemnon’ was discovered, but it’s origins are still questioned, and the methods of excavation remain under scrutiny.
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Penelope
Writen by Hazel Atkinson. Known for her unwavering fidelity, Penelope did not lose hope that her husband, Odysseus, would return from the Trojan War, despite the decades that passed. This fictional piece relates the story through the eyes of the legendary Queen of Ithaca.
Retrospect Journal 