Canaanite Lyrist (Megiddo Plaque), Late Bronze Age
Israel Museum (IDAM) 38.780
Drawing by Anne Glynnis Fawkes
Ancient Lyric Poetry
Abstract / Course Description:
Songs of love and lust, sorrow and joy, praise and blame, politics and the cosmos from the ancient Near East, Greece and Rome. Wide-ranging, fast-paced survey of texts combined with regular secondary reading and introductions to cultural-historical settings. This is a reading-intensive class, both ancient poems and secondary readings about social/historical settings and/or interpretive issues. To ensure that the reading is getting done—with the higher goal of better class-room discussion—there will be quizzes almost every day. Midterm and final also address the larger pictures developed in class. Some minor public speaking will also be expected in connection with projects involving online or in-stack research. There will also be several creative assignments.