updated 23 November 2011

 

Current position:
Professor and Chair of the Department of Classics, Temple University  

Research and Teaching Interests
Greek drama; Greek epic; Greek mythology and religion; historiography; Greek language pedagogy; Roman epic, especially Vergil; comparative approaches

Address:
Office: 327 Anderson Hall, Department of Classics, Temple University, 1114 West Berks St.,
Philadelphia PA 19122, (215) 204-3672

Education:
1988, Ph.D., Comparative Literature, Brown University
1982, B.A., Honors, University of Chicago, Classical Languages and Literatures

Research: 

Publications

In progress, submitted or forthcoming:

• Entries on the Oresteia, as well as on Agamemnon, Choephori and Eumenides for The Encyclopedia of Greek Tragedy, edited by Hannah Roisman (Blackwell, 2012)
• "Heroic Pharmacology: Sophocles and the Lanugage of Early Greek Medicine," 316-30 in A Companion to Sophocles, edited by Kirk Ormand (Blackwell)
• Book in preparation: A Companion to Euripides (Blackwell)

 

 

In preparation:

• Pelôrios Aias: the Problem of Ajax in Western Culture (monograph)
• Trojan Horses (monograph

 

Books:

 

• Aeschylus: Eumenides (Duckworth Companions to Greek and Roman Tragedy, 2009)
  • BMCR review
• Plague and the Athenian Imagination: Drama, History, and the Cult of Asclepius (Cambridge University Press, 2008) (Google Books)
  • BMCR review
  • CR review, 59 (2009) 43-45:
  • G&R review, 56 (2009) 109-10
  • Journal of Hellenic Studies review, 129 (2009) 148-49
  • Arctos 42 (2008) 314-17: http://pro.tsv.fi/kfy/arctos/reviews/42/purola.pdf
  • Past Imperfect 15 (2009): 442-49: http://ejournals.library.ualberta.ca/index.php/pi/article/viewArticle/6638
• Euripides' Hecuba. Introduction, commentary and translation (Focus Classical Library, 2005). BMCR review

 

Jointly-authored or edited volumes

• Introduction and commentary to a volume of Diane Svarlien's translation of Euripides' Medea (Hackett, 2008) BMCR review
• Introduction and commentary to a volume of Diane Svarlien's translations of Euripides' Medea, Hippolytus, Alcestis (Hackett, 2007)
• Approaches to Teaching the Dramas of Euripides (Modern Language Association, 2002). BMCR review

 

Articles and Essays:

• "Heroic Pharmacology: Sophocles and the Lanugage of Early Greek Medicine," 316-30 in A Companion to Sophocles, edited by Kirk Ormand (Blackwell, 2012)
• Entries (eight) on Homeric horses, mules and centaurs for The Homer Encyclopedia, edited by Margalit Finkelberg (Blackwel, 201l)
• "Plague and theater in 5th century Athens," The Lancet  373 (2009) 374-75
• "The Athenian Asklepieion and the End of the Philoctetes," Transactions of the American Philological Association 137 (2007) 83-112
• "The Marriage of Cassandra and the Oresteia: Text, Image, Performance," Transactions of the American Philological Association 136 (2006) 269-297
• "Was Homer an Oral Poet?"  131-134 in Classical Antiquity and Classical Studies.  History in Dispute, volume 20.  Eds. Paul Allen Miller and Charles Platter.  (Detroit, Thomson Gale, 2005)
• "Homer" in Encarta 2004
•  "Euripides' Hippolytus and the Trials of Manhood," Bucknell Review issue on Rites of Passage in Ancient Greece: Literature, Religion, Society, Spring 43 (1999) 43-67. (Google Books) BMCR review
• "Sine Fine: The Aeneid and Freud's Masterplot," American Journal of Philology 117 (1996) 289-307
• "Dramatic Scapegoating: On the Uses and Abuses of René Girard and Shakespearean Criticism," 426-37 in Tragedy and "The Tragic": Greek Theatre and Beyond, ed. M.S. Silk (Oxford University Press, 1996). (Google Books) BMCR review
• "Sacrifice and Revenge in Euripides' Hecuba," Ramus 22 (1993) 116-34
• "Freud's Reading of Classical Literature and Classical Philology," 23-46 in Reading Freud Reading (NYU Press, 1993), ed. S. Gilman (Google Books)
• "Miasma, Mimesis and Scapegoating in Euripides' Hippolytus," Classical Antiquity 10 (1991) 97-122
• "The Violence of Virginity in the Aeneid," Arethusa 24 (1991) 219-38
• "Ambiguity, Imitation and Ethics in Euripides and Buchner," 195-210 in The Scope of Words: In Honor of Albert S. Cook (New York: Peter Lang, 1991)
• "Propertius on Poetry and Poets: Traditional and the Individual Erotic Talent," Ramus 14 (1985) 46-58

 

 

Reviews:

• J. Michael Walton, Euripides Our Contemporary.   (Berkeley/Los Angeles/London:  University of California Press, 2009) Bryn Mawr Classical Review2011.01.24
• A. H. Sommerstein (ed. and trans.), Aeschylus (I). Persians, Seven against Thebes, Suppliants, Prometheus Bound; Aeschylus (II). Oresteia; Aeschylus (III). Fragments. (Loeb Classical Library. Harvard University Press, 2008). New England Classical Journal (2009) 159-61
• P. Wilson (ed.), The Greek Theatre and Festivals. Documentary Studies. Oxford Studies in Ancient Documents. (Oxford University Press, 2007) http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/bmcr/2008/2008-05-24.html
• V. Pedrick and S. M. Oberhelm (eds.) The Soul of Tragedy: A Collection of Essays in Honor of Charles Segal (University of Chicago Press), forthcoming in CLIO: A Journal of Literature, History, and the Philosophy of History.
• R. Dawe (ed.), Sophocles: Oedipus Rex (Cambridge University Press, 2006) Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2007.06.22
• T. Papadopoulou, Heracles and Euripidean Tragedy (Cambridge University Press, 2005) The Classical Bulletin 82.2 (2006) 249-51
•   J. Gregory (ed.), A Companion to Greek Tragedy (Blackwell Companions to he Ancient World, 2005), The Classical Review (2006) 57.1: 14-16
• R. H. Sternberg (ed.), Pity and Power in Ancient Athens. (Cambridge University Press, 2005) The Classical Review (2006) 57.1: 52-54
• S. A. Gurd, Iphigenias at Aulis: Textual Multiplicity, Radical Philology (Cornell University Press, 2005), Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2006.02.01
• J. Redfield, The Locrian Maidens (Princeton University Press, 2004), The Classical Bulletin 81.2 (2006) 217-19
• J. Mossman, editor, Oxford Readings in Euripides (Oxford University Press, 2004), New England Classical Journal 31 (2004) 159-61
• H. Roisman, Euripides: Alcestis (University of Oklahoma Press, 2003), Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2004.03.27
• J. Morwood, The Plays of Euripides (Bristol Classical Press, 2002), Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2003.01.31
• H. Roisman, Nothing is as it seems: The Tragedy of Hippolytus and the Implicit (Rowman and Littlefield), Classical World 93.5 (2000) 544-5
• J. Mossman, Wild Justice: A Study in Euripides' Hecuba (Oxford University Press), Bryn Mawr Classical Review 96.03.04

 

Invited talks

 

• 2011: New York University (NEH-sponsored conference); Bryn Mawr College

• 2007: Rutgers University
• 2006: Stanford University, Columbia University, Swarthmore College, AIA Westchester NY Chapter, University of Glasgow, King's College London
• 2005: University of Edinburgh, Cambridge University, Oxford University (Corpus Christi College)
• 2004: Cambridge University
• 2003: University of Pennsylvania, Stockton State College
• 1999: University of Maryland
• 1996: University of Chicago
• 1994: Oxford University (Jesus College), Harvard University
• 1993: King's College London
• 1989: Bryn Mawr College

 

Conference Papers

 

• “Relapse: The Recurring Plague in the Western Tradition,” panel co-organized with Hunter Gardner for the 2012 APA Annual Meeting
• “Jocasta the What?” APA Annual Meeting, 2011; Classical Association of the United Kingdom Annual Meeting, 2012; Classical Association of the Midwest and South Annual Meeting, 2010
• "Pelôrios Aias," CAMWS Annual Meeting, 2009; Classical Association of the United Kindgom Annual Meeting, 2008
• "Odysseus, Maker of Horses," CAMWS Annual Meeting, 2008
• "Staging the Anger of the Furies," Classical Association of the United Kindgom Annual Meeting, 2007
• "Odysseus, Maker of Horses: Hippological Considerations for Homeric Chronologies," Relative Chronology in Greek Epic Poetry, Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters, Oslo, June 2006
• "Odysseus, Maker of Horses: Remembering Troy's Fall in the Odyssey," Classical Association of the United Kingdom Annual Meeting, 2006
• "Dating the Women of Trachis." Classical Association of the United Kingdom Annual Meeting, 2005
• "Troy on Film," APA Annual Meeting, 2005 (Co-organizer of panel on Troy)
• "Can you see?" Blindness and Insight in Minority Report and Oedipus the King," APA Annual Meeting, 2004
• "The Athenian Asklepieion and the End of Philoctetes," APA Annual Meeting, 2003; Classical Association of the United Kingdom Centenary Meeting, 2003
• "Sister Sphinx? Mythic Variants, Technology and Structuralism in an American Classroom," APA Annual Meeting, 2001
• "The Marriage of Cassandra," APA Annual Meeting, 1997
• Co-organizer of and respondent to panel on Greek drama and rites of passage, APA Annual Meeting, 1996
• Numerous papers between 1988 and 1996 on tragedy and epic

 

Teaching

• Bryn Mawr College: Graduate seminar on Sophocles
• Courses in translation: Classical Mythology, On-line Mythology, Greek Drama, Classical Epic, Ancient Greek Civilization, Intellectual Heritage
• Courses in Greek and Latin: all levels of both languages (advanced courses in Sophocles, Euripides, Homer, Herodotus, Vergil and Ovid); director of Greek language pedagogy

 

Appointments

• 2009: Visiting Professor, Bryn Mawr College
• 2008-: Temple University, Professor of Classics
• 2005 Spring: Visiting Scholar in the Faculty of Classics; Visiting Fellow, Wolfson College, University of Cambridge
• 1996-2008: Temple University, Associate Professor of Classics
• 1993-96: Temple University, Assistant Professor of Classics
• 1993-94: Center for Hellenic Studies, Junior Fellow
• 1988-93: Temple University, Visiting Assistant Professor of Classics
• 1990 Fall: Haverford College, Visiting Assistant Professor of Classics

Honors and Awards

• 2011-12: NEH scholar for Ancient Greeks/Modern Lives
• 2009: Loeb Classical Library Foundation Grant
• 2006: Eleanor Hofkin Award for Excellence in Teaching, College of Liberal Arts, Temple University
• 2006: Loeb Classical Library Foundation Grant
• 2006: Temple University Summer Research Fellowship
• 2005 Spring: Visiting Fellowship, Wolfson College, University of Cambridge
• 2005 Spring: Temple University Research Leave Award
• 2003: Violet Ketels Award for Excellence in Teaching and Extraordinary Service to Intellectual Heritage
• 2003: Schoolzone (United Kingdom) 5 star award for educational materials on the world wide web
• 2001: Temple University Summer Research Fellowship
• 1998 Fall: Weblink award for excellence in educational web sites
• 1997 Fall: StudyWeb award for excellence in educational web sites
• 1997 Spring: Temple University Research Leave Award
• 1995-96: Lily Foundation Teaching Fellow
• 1995: Temple University Summer Research Fellowship
• 1993-94: Fellowship, Center for Hellenic Studies
• 1992: NEH Summer Institute on Athenian Democracy, UC Santa Cruz
• 1991: NEH Summer Seminar, Freud and the Culture of His Time, Freud Museum London