For a long time, the ancient world – Greece, the Roman Empire, but
also Babylon and Egypt – loomed large in the British imagination. In the
Middle Ages, it was believed that London was founded by a descendant of
the Trojan hero Aeneas. From the Renaissance on, English literature was
profoundly influenced by the works ancient writers. As the British
Empire developed, it came to be seen as a modern equivalent of the Roman
Empire. This led to the idea that London was the new Rome, a notion
that gained currency in the early eighteenth century and remained very
influential throughout the nineteenth century and beyond.
The ancient world as a cultural model affected many spheres of life –
from literature to architecture, art and fashion. London is full of
neo-classical architecture, paintings and statues. While London was
thought of as the new Rome, Edinburgh re-invented itself as the Athens
of the North, with an impressive neo-classical New Town and a bizarre
attempt at creating a Scottish copy of the Parthenon temple. Authors,
artists and architects speculated about how, one day, the British Empire
would be a thing of the past, and how it would be studied by
archaeologists of the future. There are historical novels set in ancient
Rome, or, even better, in Roman Britain, and there are interesting
movies (such as I, Claudius) based on such novels. In this
seminar, we are going to look at all of this … a fascinating range of
phenomena, texts, images, architecture, movies, from the Middle Ages to
the present day, and from epic poetry to The Life of Brian. This
seminar will also very probably feature special events such as an
opportunity to meet the closest equivalent of a real-life Roman
legionary (a member of a group of historical re-enactors), and possibly a
visit from a specialist in the reception of ancient history. There will
be a Moodle room in which a reader (along with other material) will be
made available. You will receive the Moodle password via e-mail.
I hope to do a study tour to London accompanying this seminar, which
would be an opportunity to look at neo-classical architecture, a
spectacular obelisk on the Thames Embankment, the weird, wonderful and
spooky Roman and Egyptian underworld in Sir John Soane´s Museum,
eighteenth-century portraits in which English people look like ancient
Romans, the actual Roman city walls of London, and many other things
besides. My plan is to do this in September – but please bear in mind
this can only happen if I manage to get a viable group of people
together. A limited number of places will be available, and those will
hopefully come with a financial subsidy to make the whole trip more
affordable.
Requirements: thorough preparation for each session, active
participation, and, if applicable, written work according to your
particular Studienordnung. As always: think, enjoy (!),
annotate, and look things up if necessary. Useful background knowledge
of key cultural, historical and literary contexts of classicism can be
found here: Christoph Heyl, Kleine Englische Literaturgeschichte. J.B. Metzler. ISBN-13: 978-3476045096.
Just in case your application is rejected by the LSF system: If you
want to do this course because you are genuinely interested, you will be
most welcome, no matter what LSF says. Please get in touch with
claudia.hausmann@uni-due.de who will enrol you manually. The worst that
might happen to you is that you cannot do a Leistungsnachweis if you lack the formal requirements.
