Emily Wilson, celebrated classicist and translator of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, is back to take on another twelve vital works of Greek and Roman literature with the LRB’s Thomas Jones, loosely themed around truth and lies – from from Aesop’s Fables to Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations.
Episodes will appear once a month throughout 2024.
Among the Ancients is part of the Close Readings podcasts collection from the London Review of Books.
To listen to all the series in full, subscribe:
Directly in Apple Podcasts at the top of this podcast
For Spotify and other podcast apps here: https://lrb.supportingcast.fm/close-readings
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Emily Wilson, celebrated classicist and translator of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, is back to take on another twelve vital works of Greek and Roman literature with the LRB’s Thomas Jones, loosely themed around truth and lies – from from Aesop’s Fables to Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations.
Episodes will appear once a month throughout 2024.
Among the Ancients is part of the Close Readings podcasts collection from the London Review of Books.
To listen to all the series in full, subscribe:
Directly in Apple Podcasts at the top of this podcast
For Spotify and other podcast apps here: https://lrb.supportingcast.fm/close-readings
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
In episode seven, we turn to some of the earliest surviving examples of Roman literature: the raucous, bawdy and sometimes bewildering world of Roman comedy. Plautus and Terence, who would go on to set the tone for centuries of playwrights (and school curricula), came from the margins of Roman society, writing primarily for plebeians and upsetting the conventions they simultaneously established. Plautus’ ‘Menaechmi’ is full of coinages, punning and madcap doubling. Terence’s troubling ‘Hecyra’ tells a much darker story of Roman sexual mores while destabilizing misogynistic stereotypes. Emily and Tom discuss how best to navigate these very early and enormously influential plays, and what they lend to Shakespeare, Sondheim and the modern sitcom.
Non-subscribers will only hear an extract from this episode. To listen in full and to our other Close Readings series, sign up:
Directly in Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3pJoFPq
In other podcast apps: lrb.me/closereadings
Further reading in the LRB:
Emily Wilson: Ave, Jeeves!
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v30/n04/emily-wilson/ave-jeeves
James Davidson: Laugh as long as you can
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v37/n14/james-davidson/laugh-as-long-as-you-can
Emily Wilson is Professor of Classical Studies at the University of Pennsylvania and Thomas Jones is an editor at the London Review of Books.
Get in touch: podcasts@lrb.co.uk
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.