Dear all,
We cordially invite you to our next CRASIS Ancient World Seminar *Monday
13th of June*. We are happy to introduce you *dr. Thorsten Fögen*. He will
expound on the depictions of animals in antique literature. His lecture has
the following title:
*Lives in Interaction: Animal 'Biographies' in Graeco-Roman Literature?*
This paper analyses some representative examples of literary texts in which
a tendency towards an individualisation of animals can be discerned. It
considers Odysseus’ dog Argus in Homer’s Odyssey, Arrian’s dog Horme in his
Cynegeticus, King Alexander’s horse Bucephalas in Plutarch and Arrian,
Corinna’s (unnamed) parrot in Ovid’s Amores 2.6, and the donkey Lucius in
Apuleius’ Metamorphoses. Special attention is given to the questions of
what kind of details on the lives of the animals in question are conveyed,
and in what way these lives are related to the human sphere. It is also
examined to what extent such accounts may be categorised as ‘biographies’
and how they differ from each other. Wherever possible, there will be some
reflexions on the specific historical and socio-political background of the
texts discussed.
Thorsten Fögen is associate professor at the University of Durham and
“Privatdozent” at Humboldt University of Berlin. His area of expertise is
Latin literature from the late Republic until the early Empire (1st c. BC –
2nd c. AD). In this he has written books on Roman authors’ attitudes
towards the Latin Language and on Roman technical writing. More recently,
he has edited the volumes Tears in the Graeco-Roman World and Bodies and
Boundaries in Graeco-Roman Antiquity. Currently, he is a fellow at the NIAS
(Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social
Sciences), working on a project titled “Emotional Elements in Ancient
Technical Texts”. The aim of which is to investigate the meaning and
function of feelings and emotions in a variety of Greek and Roman technical
texts from the fifth century B.C. until the second and third centuries A.D.
The session takes place, as usual, in *room 130* of the Faculty of Theology
and Religious Studies, Groningen, *16.15 – 17.30*.
Join us for drinks afterwards!
The organizing committee of CRASIS
--
Sjoukje Kamphorst
PhD student in Ancient History
on behalf of the CRASIS team
University of Groningen
CRASIS is the Groningen institute for Interdisciplinary Studies in Culture,
Religion and Society of the Ancient World. Follow CRASIS on Facebook
<https://www.facebook.com/rug.crasis> or find out more about us on
www.rug.nl/crasis.
