Monday, November 14, 2011

Hadrian gets a cartoon

Kate Beaton has updated her absolutely lovely comic Hark! A Vagrant with another series of riffs on Edward Gorey book covers. Featured in the latest is:


Exegi monumentum aere perennius

Horace, Ode 3.30

Exegi monumentum aere perennius
regalique situ pyramidum altius,
quod non imber edax, non Aquilo impotens
possit diruere aut innumerabilis
annorum series et fuga temporum.
Non omnis moriar multaque pars mei
vitabit Libitinam; usque ego postera
crescam laude recens. Dum Capitolium
scandet cum tacita virgine pontifex,
dicar, qua violens obstrepit Aufidus
et qua pauper aquae Daunus agrestium
regnavit populorum, ex humili potens,
princeps Aeolium carmen ad Italos
deduxisse modos. Sume superbiam
quaesitam meritis et mihi Delphica
lauro cinge volens, Melpomene, comam.

I have completed a monument more lasting than bronze
and loftier than the kingly structure of the pyramids,
which neither consuming rain nor the headstrong North East wind
is able to destroy, nor the countless
succession of years and the flight of ages.
I will not wholly die and a great part of me
will evade the goddess of death; on and on I,
fresh with ensuing praise, will thrive. As long as
the pontifex ascends the Capitoline with a silent virgin,
I will be spoken of, where the Aufidus roars
and where Daunus, poor in water,
ruled his rustic people, powerful from a humble origin,
as the first to have brought Aeolian song into
Italian meters. Accept the proud honor
obtained by your merits and with a Delphic laurel,
Melpomene, willingly encircle my locks.
              Translated by me (E.M.H), November 2011


We're just finishing up Book 3 of the Odes in my Horace class. This is one of my perennial (no pun intended) favorites. The ode, the final poem of the three book collection, is composed in the first Asclepiadean meter, which only occurs elsewhere at Ode 1.1 (a nice metrical bookend, of sorts).

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

I've been the worst blogger ever but I think a fresh start is in good order...

...mostly because I think updating this blog on at least a weekly basis will be a really nice outlet for all of the classics-related internet finds and personal thoughts, exacerbated by my senior thesis, that I feel bad about sharing excessively with my friends (not all of whom are quite so inclined) on my other social media outlets.

So, updates to come in the next few days––a week at the latest!––on my summer research grant project and, of course, that simultaneously wonderful and horrifying thing that is my Thesis.

Forgot to post this in July, but the footnote still amuses me

"Finally, when a victory was much desired, a very rich patron could of course enter more than one team of horses, chariots, or mulecarts to improve his chances of winning. [Footnote: Cf. Th. 6.16 Alcibiades entering with seven chariots, which admittedly was thought to be rather excessive.]" (from W.E. van den Groenendaal, Mnemosyne 63, p. 392)

Monday, June 13, 2011

Odyssey 8

They reached for the good things that lay outspread
and when they'd put aside desire for food and drink,
Odysseus, master of many exploits, praised the singer:
 

"I respect you, Demodocus, more than any man alive--
surely the Muse has taught you, Zeus's daughter,
or god Apollo himself. How true to life,
all too true . . . you sing the Achaeans' fate,
all they did and suffered, all they soldiered through, 550
as if you were there yourself or heard from one who was.
But come now, shift your ground. Sing of the wooden horse
Epeus built with Athena's help, the cunning trap that
good Odysseus brought one day to the heights of Troy,
filled with fighting men who laid the city waste.
Sing that for me--true to life as it deserves--
and I will tell the world at once how freely
the Muse gave you the gods' own gift of song."


Stirred now by the Muse, the bard launched out
in a fine blaze of song, starting at just the point 560
where the main Achaean force, setting their camps afire,
had boarded the oarswept ships and sailed for home
but famed Odysseus' men already crouched in hiding--
in the heart of Troy's assembly--dark in that horse
the Trojans dragged themselves to the city heights.
Now it stood there, looming . . .
and round its bulk the Trojans sat debating,
clashing, days on end. Three plans split their ranks:
either to hack open the hollow vault with ruthless bronze
or haul it up to the highest ridge and pitch it down the cliffs 570
or let it stand--a glorious offering made to pacify the gods--
and that, that final plan, was bound to win the day.
For Troy was fated to perish once the city lodged
inside her walls the monstrous wooden horse
where the prime of Argive power lay in wait
with death and slaughter bearing down on Troy.
 

And he sang how troops of Achaeans broke from cover,
streaming out of the horse's hollow flanks to plunder Troy--
he sang how left and right they ravaged the steep city,
sang how Odysseus marched right up to Deiphobus' house 580
like the god of war on attack with diehard Menelaus.
There, he sang, Odysseus fought the grimmest fight
he had ever braved but he won through at last,
thanks to Athena's superhuman power.
 

That was the song the famous harper sang
but great Odysseus melted into tears,
running down from his eyes to wet his cheeks . . .
as a woman weeps, her arms flung round her darling husband,
a man who fell in battle, fighting for town and townsmen,
trying to beat the day of doom from home and children. 590
Seeing the man go down, dying, gasping for breath,
she clings for dear life, screams and shrills--
but the victors, just behind her,
digging spear-butts into her back and shoulders,
drag her off in bondage, yoked to hard labor, pain,
and the most heartbreaking torment wastes her cheeks.
So from Odysseus' eyes ran tears of heartbreak now.
But his weeping went unmarked by all the others;
only Alcinous, sitting close beside him,
noticed his guest's tears...

 Trans. by Robert Fagles, 1996.

Saturday, June 4, 2011

I promise I will post about my summer research soon...

(it's really awesome and I'm so excited about it, but at the moment it is too hot to think—first ridiculous sunny day in Portland—so I will give you in the meantime this beautiful GIF):







Monday, May 2, 2011

Classics meets current events

My fellow classics student and friend Ben (@plmwinedrnkrd) posted this earlier on twitter - got a kick out of it and thought I'd share:


Wednesday, April 27, 2011

It's almost summer

I know it's almost half past midnight, but I can't help but wish I were sitting on a grassy lawn under the sun, in a light cotton dress, sipping Pimm's cups.


It'll happen.


The final statistics

29 pages
8,688 words
13 poems (Greek and Latin) translated and analyzed
2 hilarious epigrammatists
2 crazy emperors (this could be a sitcom)
1 semester-long junior qualifying exam (a.k.a. qual, a.k.a. qualrus)


/victory


My orals board is on Friday. I'm scared (I know I shouldn't be, but I can't help it). Really I should just put it out of my head and focus on the fact that I still have four papers to finish before Renn Fayre rolls around in a week and a half.


I have been an awful blogger as of late (sorry to my non-existent readers!). I promise frequent updates in the future - especially once the end of the semester rolls around and I will have oodles of time and will be reading/translating/researching many delightful things.


A wordle for your enjoyment:






Monday, March 7, 2011

The Violoncellist

[This post is left-over from several weeks ago. Forgot to post. Whoops!]


I feel a bit wrong updating this blog from the library (usually I am very particular these days about only using my computer in here for writing papers, doing research, or checking email, though I will occasionally deviate from that and do an online crossword or read the blogs I follow; thankfully I have left my younger self's days of library facebook/tv watching/text twist behind me), but I just finished writing a significant chunk of a paper in the last half-hour, and so this seemed to me to be at least a (vaguely) constructive break.

The paper in question is for my art history class this semester, and I've really fallen in love with the work that I'm analyzing for it. 


 Gustave Courbet, The Violoncellist, 1847, oil on canvas

My previous familiarity with Courbet, one of the foremost figures of the Realist movement in France during the mid- to late-19th century, has extended mostly to two of his most famous works, Un enterrement à Ornans (A Burial at Ornans), and the highly controversial and scandalous (click at your own risk, it is very much NSFW) L'Origine du monde (The Origin of the World).


Courbet's use of tenebrism in The Violoncellist is striking, no? I'm struck by the similarities to some Rembrandt paintings I've seen in various museums - the intense chiaroscuro, compelling figure, very painterly. What do you all think?

Rette mich

I just received a book from Interlibrary Loan that I need for my junior qual, because it's the only real in-depth textual study that has been done on the subject I'm writing about.


Its title: Untersuchungen zur Struktur des Witzepigrams bei Lukillios und Martial. Which means, unfortunately, that it is all in German. Why oh why, my parents, did you not make me keep learning German after age 4? All of those Muzzy tapes gone to waste! All I remember is "Ich bin Bob; ich bin der Gärtner" and "Ich bin die Prinzessin Sylvia." Really though this is my own damn fault since I dropped German last term because my schedule was too stressful. I can conjugate basic verbs, talk about school supplies, the weather, and numbers, but that's about it. 


If I don't pull an Oedipus and poke out my eyes by the end of the semester, I'll be quite pleased with myself.

Monday, February 14, 2011

Happy Lupercalia everyone!

While we all in the here-and-now may consider February 14th Valentine's Day, in my mind, it is Lupercalia! Time to sacrifice some goats and run around Rome half-naked hitting people with a hide thong!


My February 14ths have always been considerably lackluster. I woke up this morning, resigning myself to a day that is just like most other days in Portland—slightly chilly, vaguely rainy, no sun in sight—only with the added benefit of large quantities of chocolate. But the prospect of a mostly depressing morning quickly disappeared when I opened up my email inbox to find a message from one of my professors (and qual adviser), asking me to work on a ridiculously interesting joint research project with him over the summer, that I would receive compensation for and my name listed as a co-author on the final publication. 


I am so excited I could burst. I'll post a bit more on this later, but right now I want to jump around giddily (and then should probably translate some Aristotle...).

Monday, February 7, 2011

Cross-posted this to twitter already, but it deserves a spot here as well

(I absolutely adore that my friends link me to these kinds of things. Shout out to Erin, my lovely flatmate, for this!)


From Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal comics

Friday, January 28, 2011

Quick update

I have been a rather poor blogger as of late. I do have an excuse, however, as a week ago today I flew back to Portland and have been catching up with friends and preparing for the semester to begin this coming Monday. On top of that, I just moved into an apartment (which I'm extremely pleased about). Regardless, I haven't had as much time to update, which I promise will be remedied soon!

I am currently reading articles for my classes on Tuesday: one on Flavian Rome, two critical essays on art history, two on ideas of ethnicity in the ancient world, and one on Boasian anthropology and cultural boundaries. Really REALLY loving the Flavian Rome one. My classes (Art History: Theories of Visuality; Barbarians in the Ancient World; Greek: Aristotle's Poetics; Latin: Martial) are going to be wonderful.

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Playing with Wordle

Wordle is a tool that's quite fun - paste text or enter a URL, and it will generate a word cloud for you. I've tried it for this blog, an old blog of mine, and even several essays. Go have fun with it! Here's one for a paper I wrote last semester:


Pretty obvious what the paper was on, huh?


Monday, January 17, 2011

Ἑλλάς Dreamin'

Our last night in Athens, view from a rooftop


At some point I might write an entry here on my time in Greece last summer (on a dig in Pylos and then in Athens), but for right now, this photo will have to suffice. I cannot begin to describe how much I miss it all.

Saturday, January 15, 2011

Slowly dwindling funds via books

Ordered the rest of my course books today. The reading lists look phenomenal and my excited anticipation of this semester has increased tenfold. Only hoping that this (Craig Williams's) translation of and commentary on the second book of Martial's epigrams is worth the $75. This might be a shot in the dark but has anyone read or used it before?

Friday, January 14, 2011

Book recommendation & "Chickpea"

I've been a lazy Classicist, because instead of reading frightfully esoteric texts or working on Pindar translations, I have been devouring Robert Harris's novel Imperium. Although as of late I've considered myself more of a Hellenist than a Latinist, my first love in this discipline was Republican (and early Imperial) Rome, and this delightful book has been feeding that flame.


It is a fictional biography of Cicero, told from the perspective of his slave and secretary Tiro, and follows Cicero through the first 20 or so years of his career. I highly recommend it as a fast-paced, enthralling, and fun read for anyone who loves or is even vaguely interested in Roman history. I was particularly pleased by Harris's treatment of Cicero's prosecution of Verres (which dominates the first half of the novel), as I quite recently read the Verrine orations myself for the first time, and thoroughly enjoyed seeing them appear and be explored here in this kind of context. Harris does a wonderful job in marrying textual evidence to an engaging fictional-historical background.


It's a quick read and worth picking up.

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

"While Pompeii Crumbles"

The Wall Street Journal discusses the recent Pompeii collapses and funding for archaeological preservation in Italy. Read here.

Monday, January 10, 2011

And it slowly begins

I'm beginning to do research on graduate programs in classics and archaeology. Am rather petrified (will anyone accept me?) and excited (I could finally do work on Linear B!).


But considering how I feel about my discipline, hopefully I'll be okay...

Not quite classics but...




Why Denys Finch Hatton is a hot dead guy. From http://bangabledudesinhistory.blogspot.com/

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Things to follow/read online

Archaeology news - The Archaeological Institute of America's news site, updated every weekday. Keep up-to-date on the most recent archaeological discoveries and controversies.


RogueClassicism - One of my favorite blogs/sites ever. Lots of classical news/tidbits/interesting things. Many of my most beloved classical non-sequiturs have been discovered here.


@AlexanderIII on Twitter - Alexander the Great of Macedon. On Twitter. WHAT'S NOT TO LOVE!?! Hilarious and smart, check it out!


TextKit - a site to help you learn (or review) Latin and Greek. Quite a number of textbooks or reference books are available for download. I've been trying to review my Greek grammar a bit before the semester starts and since I left my books at Reed, this website has been a great resource.


(From McSweeney's) Suggested edits to the movie 300 for the DVD release of 300: the definitive, historically accurate cut. - Just for fun.


P.S. For all the sites that have RSS feeds, you should get a Google Reader (I've had one for over a month now and it has changed my online reading habits for the better! Follow my shared items there - search for elizisme@gmail.com)

Monday, January 3, 2011

Brain slowly going to mush

I have been watching altogether too much television that is intended for children under the age of 14. It's probably attributable to the fact that I haven't felt completely ship-shape the last few days (on and off fatigue and some bumps and bruises here and there - leftover from an unfortunately crazy New Year's Eve - have aided in my complete desire to just plop down on pillows and friend-snuggle with Jen and watch the Disney channel). Regardless, I really REALLY need to get back to reading real things, so that I'm not completely out of my element when I walk into Ellen's class and she assigns 600 pages of historical text. Maybe will start slow and first reread some children's books. Then, on to the reading list.