The ancient Greek and Roman tradition of epic poetry preserves the some of the earliest and best-known examples of Western literature. Indeed, such poems as the Iliad and Aeneid continue to exert an influence on modern literature and popular culture.
          This course examines the development of the Greco-Roman epic genre in the context of the political and social world of the Mediterranean region from its origins in oral performance traditions in the Bronze Age to the Roman Imperial period. Readings will focus on Homeric and Hesiodic poetry, Apollonios' Hellenistic epic Argonautika, the Roman epics of Virgil and Ovid, and will include earlier texts that influenced indirectly the development of Greco-Roman literary forms, including the Epic of Gilgamesh.
    This course fulfills University of Florida General Education Requirement H (Humanities).

•     the SYLLABUS
  

required texts (buy online or at area bookstores)
NOTE: other editions are OK for this class, but it is up to the student to match the readings to the proper page numbers of any alternative texts.

• Gods and Heroes of the Greeks: The Library of Apollodorus, translated by Michael Simpson. University of Massachusetts Press ISBN 0870232061
• Hesiod Theogony, translated by Richard Caldwell. Focus ISBN 0941051005
• Homer Iliad, translated by Richmond Lattimore. University of Chicago Press ISBN 0226469409
• Homer Odyssey, translated by Richmond Lattimore. Perennial Classics ISBN 0060931957
• Apollonius of Rhodes Jason and the Golden Fleece (the Argonautica), translated by E. V. Rieu.  Penguin ISBN-13: 9780141026329 [OUT OF PRINT: USE LINK ON SYLLABUS]
  
• Virgil Aeneid, translated by David West. Penguin ISBN 0140449329
• Ovid Metamorphoses, translated by A. D. Melville. Oxford University Press ISBN 019283472X
• Lucan Civil War (aka Pharsalia), translated by Susan Braund. Oxford University Press ISBN 0192839497 or 0199540683
  

evaluation
weekly quizzes (non-cumulative); best 10 of 11 @ 6% each = 60% of total grade
    1/14, 1/26, 2/2, 2/11, 2/20, 2/27, 3/20, 3/27, 4/3, 4/10, 4/17

exams (non-cumulative): 2 @ 20% each = 40% of total grade
    Exam #1: Wednesday March 4
    Exam #2: Wednesday April 22 (last class day)

course downloads

LECTURE OUTLINES FOR 1/14-1/23

LECTURE OUTLINES FOR 1/26-1/30

LECTURE OUTLINES FOR 2/2-2/9

LECTURE OUTLINES FOR 2/11-2/18

LECTURE OUTLINES FOR 2/20-2/27

LECTURE OUTLINES FOR 3/16-3/18

LECTURE OUTLINES FOR 3/20-3/25

LECTURE OUTLINES FOR 3/27-4/1

LECTURE OUTLINES FOR 4/3-4/10

LECTURE OUTLINES FOR 4/13-4/17