CLAS 2023 - Poetry and the Passions in Antiquity

The course focuses upon the ways in which various 'passions' or extreme emotional states (love, hate, rage, jealousy, grief, joy etc.) were expressed and explored in the poetry of the Ancient Greek and Roman worlds. Beginning with the love poetry of the Greek poet Sappho (6th century BC) and ending with the early Christian poet Prudentius' descriptions of the 'passions' of the martyrs (5th century CE), the course will traverse a wide variety of poetic genres and emotional states including the invective and ridicule of early Greek poets such as Hipponax, the satirical poetry of the Roman poets Juvenal and Martial and the mourning elegies and lyrics of poets such as Catullus and Horace. Throughout the course we will explore such questions as: How did people deal with and react to extreme emotional states in the ancient world?; Why is poetry such a good vehicle for conveying emotion?; To what extent were there set conventions and established methods of conveying these emotions in ancient poetry? How far were the different poetic forms and various 'passions' a product of the particular social conditions under which they were produced?