Encouraged by the response to our online courses this Fall, we are happy to announce the continuation of our Ancient Greek classes into the Spring.
Our tutors are Dr. George Gazis and Dr. Chiara Blanco who will lead the classes live.
The deadline for application for the Theocritus Reading Week is December 31st 2020.
The deadline for application for Reading Greek for Philosphers and Beginners Greek, which continue for another 10 weeks, is January 10th 2021.
Courses will be taught live on Zoom and recordings of the lessons will be available after each class to those who register.
BEGINNERS ANCIENT GREEK COURSE (continues from January 13th 2021)
This course is aimed at Greek learners with a knowledge of the alphabet and some basic notions of the Greek language (article, declensions, pronouns, verbs etc.).
We will be following the texts in “Reading Greek Beginners Course”, supplemented by grammar and syntax handouts where necessary.
We will revise the first part of the textbook, in order to refresh basic concepts and we will begin to read some simple Greek texts.
The course will continue through January to March 2021, with another 10 classes (2 hours each) in total, starting from January 13th and finishing on March 17th. If you have not taken part in our Summer or Autumn Beginners Greek course, it is still posssible to join the Spring ’21 course if you have basic knowledge of the language. Please contact us to check.
The course will be taught live online on Zoom. Classes will be recorded.
GREEK FOR PHILOSOPHERS READING GROUP
We will be meeting once a week online to read from the original text one of the Platonic dialogues, the Phaedrus, (http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0174:text=Phaedrus).
The Greek for Philosophers Reading Group is open to all levels of Greek learners, from Beginners to Advanced level, since the focus will be mostly on the content rather than the language. Participants will be asked to prepare a translation of a short passage in advance and then present their translation in class, after which the discussion of the content will be open to all.
Translating will not be compulsory for participants and in the case of lack of translators, the seminar leader will lead the group through the text.
The aim of the reading group is to provide students and scholars interested in Plato with an informal platform in which they can come in contact with the text in the original Greek and discuss the content in a relaxed and friendly environment.
There will be 10 ( x 1 hour) weekly meetings, starting on the 13th of January and finishing on the 17th of March 2021. The course will be taught live online on Zoom. Classes will be recorded.
ONLINE READING WEEK : ANCIENT GREEK POETRY IN SICILY; THEOCRITUS
3rd – 8th of January 2021, 17:00 – 19:00 Italian time CET
Theocritus, Sicily’s most renowned poet in antiquity, has captured the island’s beauty and allure in his Idylls, offering us a window through its landscapes into the everyday life of its ancient inhabitants, including their love-affairs and disappointments, fears and hopes.
In this brief course, we will be reading Idylls 1 and 11, in which the poet paints a vivid and ever-changing picture of Sicily in his time by combining the simplicity of the lonely herdsman’s life with the complex web of myths and narratives he inherits from his classical predecessors. Follow us on a journey from Etna’s flaming peaks to the stream of Fonte Arethusa in Syracuse and to the isolated island of the Cyclops, where Polyphemus invites us to listen to his lamentation about his unfulfilled love for the beautiful nymph Galatea.
The course is open to all levels of Greek learners, although knowledge of the alphabet and basic constructions will be required. We will go through the two Idylls slowly with the main focus on the content, while simultaneously keeping an eye out for the peculiarities of the Doric idiom which the poet adopts, adapts and reinvents.
Course cost : 130 euros
All courses will be taught in English by George Gazis and Chiara Blanco.
Dr Gazis is Assistant Professor in Greek Literature at the Department of Classics and Ancient History, at Durham University. His research interests lie in Archaic Greek Poetry (mainly Homer), as well as Greek Lyric and Tragedy. He is the author of Homer and the poetics of Hades (OUP, 2018) and the editor of Aspects of Death in Greek Literature (LUP, forthcoming).
Dr Blanco is a Research Lecturer in Classics at Trinity College, University of Oxford. Before joining Trinity, she was a Lecturer in Classics at Exeter College, Oxford, and she also taught Classics at Durham University and the University of Cambridge, where she also completed her PhD. Her main research interests lie in the intersections between ancient literature (Greek tragedy in particular) and medicine, and she is also interested in the role of the senses and emotions in Greek and Roman culture.
FOR YOUR DIARIES : 2021 COURSES – Details to be announced
Dates 2-14 August 2021
Classical Languages Summer School in Sicily
– 1 week dedicated to philosophy and 1 week dedicated to drama (Ancient Greek and Latin)
Covid permitting, this course will be held in Siracusa, Sicily. Online participation may be possible.