Art & Death in Neronian Culture - Syllabus

PRIMARY SET TEXTS IN ENGLISH (ESSENTIAL READING FOR ALL STUDENTS)  

  • Lucan Civil War
  • Suetonius The Twelve Caesars (Life of Nero only)
  • Petronius Satyricon 
  • Tacitus The Annals of Imperial Rome Books 13-16
  • Seneca Apocolocyntosis 
  • 'Seneca’ Octavia 

Recommended translations:

  • Lucan Civil War, translated with an introduction and notes by Susan H. Braund (Oxford World’s Classics 1992)
  • Suetonius The Twelve Caesars, translated by Robert Graves (Life of Nero only) (rev. edn., Penguin 2007)
  • Petronius Satyricon in The Satyricon by Petronius and the Apocolocyntosis by Seneca, translated with introductions and notes by J. P. Sullivan (Penguin 1977)
  • Tacitus The Annals of Imperial Rome (Books 13-16 only), translated with an introduction by Michael Grant (Penguin 1971)
  • Seneca Apocolocyntosis in The Satyricon by Petronius and the Apocolocyntosis by Seneca, translated with introductions and notes by J. P. Sullivan (Penguin 1977)
  • 'Seneca’ Octavia in Four Tragedies and Octavia by Seneca, translated with an introduction by E. F. Watling (Penguin 1966)

If you wish to use translations other than those listed above, this may well be fine as there is often more than one good translation. Please check with the module tutor.

Ideally all students (i.e. Latinists and non-Latinists) should at least look at the Latin of the texts we are studying. You will find these in the Loeb Classical Library series.

OTHER PRIMARY TEXTS (USEFUL BACKGROUND)

  • Dio Cassius 61-3
  • Suetonius’ Lives of the poets Persius and Lucan (both were contemporary with Nero)
  • Seneca’s tragedies in Penguin Four Tragedies and Octavia
  • Virgil Aeneid (for help in understanding Lucan De Bello Civili
 

For the style of the era, see Michael Winterbottom (ed) Roman Declamation (Bristol Classical Press)

Reception in European Culture:

Film: Federico Fellini Satyricon (in Italian with English subtitles)

Opera: Claudio Monteverdi The Coronation of Poppaea

Fiction: Robert Graves Epics are out of fashion; I Claudius, Claudius the God

 

PRIMARY SET TEXTS IN LATIN (ESSENTIAL READING FOR STUDENTS TAKING THE MODULE IN LATIN)

  • Tacitus Annals 15.32-74: available in an edition, ed. by N. P. Miller (MacMillan 1973)
  • Lucan The Civil War Book 1: available in the Loeb edition of 1997, tr. by J. D. Duff
  • Petronius Cena Trimalchionis (a continuous episode from the Satyricon) chaps 26-46 incl. only: the Latin text is edited with useful introduction by M. S. Smith (Oxford 1975)

 

Autumn Term 2010

Week 1 Introduction: Roman Literature After Augustus

Week 2 Lecture: Was Nero Real? Roman Historiography and Biography

Seminar: Tacitus’ version of Nero

Week 3 Lecture: Roman Biography and Suetonius

Seminar: Tacitus and Suetonius on Nero

Week 4 Lecture: Tacitus as a literary artist

Seminar: Annals 15.38-44: The fire in Rome

Week 5 Lecture: Introduction to Seneca’s life and work

Seminar: Tacitus on Seneca: Annals 15.45, 60-65

WEEK 6 READING WEEK

Week 7

Lecture: Background to the Apocolocyntosis

Seminar: The Apocolocyntosis

Week 8

Lecture: Lucan – an introduction

Seminar: Lucan and Nero

Week 9 (FIRST ASSESSED ESSAY DUE)

Lecture: Lucan, Declamation and Silver Age Literature

Seminar: Lucan and Virgil as epic poets

Week 10

Lecture: Lucan’s Caesar in the storm (Book 5.476ff)

Seminar: Rhetoric in classical historiography – a resumé

 

Spring Term 2011

Week 1

Lecture: Essay returns

Seminar: Petronius and Tacitus

Week 2

Lecture: True nature of the Satyricon

Seminar: Trimalchio and Nero

Week 3

Lecture: The Dinner of Trimalchio: Language and social class in the Satyricon

Seminar: Literature and parody in the Satyricon

Week 4

Lecture: Embedded narratives in Petronius’ Satyricon

Seminar Reading/Background to the Octavia 

Week 5

Lecture: Octavia as history

Seminar: Class reading of Octavia

WEEK 6 READING WEEK (SECOND ASSESSED ESSAY DUE)

Week 7

Lecture: Showing of Fellini’s Satyricon (This will involve booking an appropriate theatre and timetabling for 2 hours)

Seminar: Fellini’s film

Week 8

Lecture: Roman thought, Stoicism and Neronian literature

Seminar: Essay returns

Week 9

Lecture: Essay returns con’td

Seminar: Showing of Coronation of Poppaea (3 hours)

Week 10

Seminar: Seminar on Coronation of Poppaea

 

Summer Term 2011

Week 1

Relationship between art and death (i)

Relationship between art and death (ii)

Weeks 2-4

Revision classes on specific texts, authors and themes; examination technique; attention to translation and context questions.