Tatiana Bur joins me in the Lesche to discuss her new book Technologies of the Marvellous in Ancient Greek Religion (Cambridge University Press 2025).

Ancient texts

• Homer, Iliad 18 (on Hephaestus and his self-moving tripods)
• Many Athenian tragedies and comedies that made use of the μηχανή or κράδη (in comedy)
• Aristotle, Poetics (on the theatrical ‘crane’/μηχανή)
• The Aristotelian/Peripatetic work Mechanical Questions (Μηχανικά)
• Philo of Byzantium, Μηχανική Σύνταξη
• Works on mechanics by Hero of Alexandria
• Polybios, History 12.13, on the mechanical snail in the procession at Athens
• Philostratus, Lives of the Sophists 2.5, on Herodes Atticus’ mechanical Panathenaic ship
• Athenaeus, Deipnosophistai 196a-203c, on the πομπή of Ptolemy Philadelphus

Modern bibliography

• Eric Csapo's work on ancient theater
• Alfred Gell’s work on art agency, particularly "technologies of enchantment"
• Susan Harvey, 2006. Scenting Salvation: Ancient Christianity and the Olfactory Imagination. Berkeley, Ca.
• Verity Platt, 2011. Facing the Gods: Epiphany in Graeco-Roman Art, Literature, and Religion. Cambridge.
• Hans-Jörg Rheinberger, 1997. Toward a History of Epistemic Things: Synthesizing Proteins in the Test Tube. Stanford, CA.

________________________________

Thanks for joining us in the Lesche!

Podcast art: Daniel Blanco
Theme music: "The Song of Seikilos," recomposed by Eftychia Christodoulou using Sibelius

This podcast is made possible with the generous support of Brown University’s Department of Classical Studies and the John Nicholas Brown Center for Advanced Study.

Instagram: @leschepodcast
Email: leschepodcast@gmail.com
Suggest a book using this form

Mary Beard, Classics editor at the Times Literary Supplement and Clifford Ando, senior editor of the Bryn Mawr Classical Review, join me in the Lesche to discuss the state of Classics reviewing today.

• How do the TLS and BMCR assign appropriate reviewers?
• What makes for a good review?
• What's the line between critique and nastiness?
• Why are reviews these days so often lacking in susbtantive criticism?
• What do editors wish review authors knew or would consider before writing a review?

Some bibliography

• Clifford Ando, "BMCR: A view under the hood." Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2022.11.26. (Read all the papers from the 30th anniversary celebration of BMCR here. Several deal with book reviewing.)
• Mary Beard, Confronting the Classics: Traditions, Adventures, and Innovations. Liveright 2013. (See especially the Afterword, "Reviewing Classics".)
• Daniel Mendelsohn, "A Critic's Manifesto," The New Yorker, August 28, 2012.

About our guests

Clifford Ando teaches Classics and History at the University of Chicago. His work focuses on the histories of law, religion, and government in the ancient world. He is the author, editor, and translator of some 20 books, and he has served as an editor, associate editor, or senior editor of Bryn Mawr Classical Review for not quite twenty years.

Mary Beard is professor emerita of classics at the University of Cambridge, a fellow of Newnham College, and professor of Ancient Literature at the Royal Academy. She is also the classics editor of the Times Literary Supplement, a fellow of the British Academy, and an international member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She is the author of more than twenty books on the ancient world. Her latest book, Talking Classics: The Shock of the Old, is due out in spring 2026 with Profile Books (UK) and the University of Chicago Press (USA).

________________________________

Thanks for joining us in the Lesche!

Podcast art: Daniel Blanco
Theme music: "The Song of Seikilos," recomposed by Eftychia Christodoulou using Sibelius

This podcast is made possible with the generous support of Brown University’s Department of Classical Studies and the John Nicholas Brown Center for Advanced Study.

Instagram: @leschepodcast
Email: leschepodcast@gmail.com
Suggest a book using this form

Harvard University historian Paul Kosmin joins me in the Lesche to discuss his recent book The Ancient Shore (Harvard University Press 2024), winner of the American Historical Association's 2025 Prize in History Prior to CE 1000.

Works mentioned

• Agatharchides of Cnidus, On the Erythraean Sea (2nd C. BC)
• Philip de Loutherbourg, "Shipwreck" (painting, 1793).
• Demuth, Bathsheba. 2019. Floating Coast: An Environmental History of the Bering Strait. W. W. Norton.
• Dening, Gregory Moore. 1980. Islands and Beaches: Discourse on a Silent Land, Marquesas, 1774–1880. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.

About our guest

Paul Kosmin completed his undergraduate degree at Oxford and earned a PhD in Ancient History from Harvard University in 2012. He was appointed an Assistant Professor in Harvard's Classics Department in 2012, was tenured in 2019, and in 2020 became the Philip J. King Professor of Ancient History, where he currently serves as Interim Chair. His research focuses on the political and cultural history of the ancient Greek world, concentrating on the globalizing and colonial Hellenistic period, and now includes an environmentally-oriented turn.

________________________________

Thanks for joining us in the Lesche!

Podcast art: Daniel Blanco
Theme music: "The Song of Seikilos," recomposed by Eftychia Christodoulou using Sibelius

This podcast is made possible with the generous support of Brown University’s Department of Classical Studies and the John Nicholas Brown Center for Advanced Study.

Instagram: @leschepodcast
Email: leschepodcast@gmail.com
Suggest a book using this form