HSS Research Seminar Series: Professor Sarah Brown 'Ovid in the Anthropocene'

Abstract:

Critics are increasingly viewing the classics through the lens of ecocriticism, exploring ways in which ancient myths and Greek tragedies, for example, can speak to the climate crisis.  Ovid’s Metamorphoses, with its focus on disruption and transformation in the natural world, including climatic catastrophes, is particularly well aligned with this approach.  In this short paper I will focus not on Ovid’s original text, but on a modern response to the Metamorphoses, Metamorphic: 21st century poets respond to Ovid, edited by Nessa O’Mahony and Paul Munden.  This edited collection of new poetry was published in 2017 to mark the 2000th anniversary of Ovid’s death. One of the most powerful recurring themes in the volume is humanity’s impact on the environment. I will explore some of the different ways in which poets find a contemporary significance in the stories Ovid tells of fire, flood, and humanity’s destruction of the natural world.

Speaker:

Sarah Brown is Professor of English Literature at ARU. Her research interests range from Ovid and Shakespeare to the Victorian novel and modern science fiction.

Free refreshments will be served from 4.45pm.

Join this event on Microsoft Teams.