As many of you doubtless know, Bernard Knox, the former Director of Washington's Center for Hellenic Studies, passed away on July 22 at the age of 95.

His was indeed a remarkable life.

Born in Bradford, West Yorkshire, England, on November 24, 1914, Bernard Knox studied classics at St. John's College, Cambridge, graduating in 1936.  A passionate opponent of fascism, he then went off to fight in the Spanish Civil War, where he was wounded, nearly fatally (you can find his own reflections on this part of his life in "Premature Anti-Fascist," a lecture he delivered at NYU in 1998.)

In 1939, he married Betty Baur, an American he had met in Cambridge (she went on to become a novelist, writing under the pseudonym Bianca Van Orden, and died in 2006), and subsequently moved to the United States.  Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, he joined the U.S. Army, returning to Britain in 1943 as an air defense officer.  Not satisfied with his duties, he applied to the Office of Strategic Services, which took note of his fluent French and, despite his "communist" history with the international brigades in Spain, assigned him to a special unit charged with coordinating the French Resistance and Allied troops advancing into France after the Normandy invasion.  He later went to northern Italy to work with the Italian underground, and it was there that he rediscovered the classics, happening upon a copy of Virgil in an abandoned villa.

Returning from the war with a Bronze Star, the Croix de Guerre, and fluency in French, Spanish, and Italian, he completed a Ph.D. at Yale and went on to teach there, becoming a full professor in 1959.  In 1961, he was named Director of the Center for Hellenic Studies, a post he held until his retirement in 1985.

Bernard Knox published many books, beginning with Oedipus at Thebes (1957).  Other titles include The Heroic Temper: Studies in Sophoclean Tragedy (1964), Word and Action: Essays in Ancient Theater (1980), Essays Ancient and Modern (1989), The Oldest Dead White European Males and Other Reflections on the Classics (1993), and Backing into the Future: The Classical Tradition and Its Renewal (1994). Many of his essays were published in widely circulated journals such as The New Republic and The New York Review of Books.  Late in his career, he wrote detailed introductions to Robert Fagles' translations of Sophocles' Theban plays (1982), Homer's Iliad (1990) and Odyssey (1996) and Virgil's Aeneid (2006).  Most recently, he supplied the introduction to Charles Martin's translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses (2005).

He was the recipient of many honorary degrees and distinctions, including the George Jean Nathan Award for dramatic criticism in 1977, the Charles Frankel Prize of the National Endowment of the Humanities in 1990, and the Jefferson Medal of the Philosophical Society of America in 2004.  In 1992, the National Council on the Humanities chose him to deliver its annual Jefferson Lecture on the Humanities, the highest award conferred by the federal government for distinguished intellectual achievement in the humanities.

My own acquaintance with Bernard Knox began in 1974-1975, when I was a Fellow at the Center.  It is no secret that Bernard became more conservative as he grew older. I, on the other hand, arrived at the Center under the spell of the ideas introduced by French thinkers such as Lévi-Strauss, Barthes, Foucault, and Derrida.  Bernard, for all his massive erudition and left-wing past, clearly felt that most of this added up to a bunch of nonsense (his strong literary bent made him eternally uncomfortable with theory).  He was, however, a person of integrity who was capable of respecting the opinions of others, becoming one of my staunchest supporters as the years went by.

I remember his amused contempt for petty academic politics.  I also remember the singular effect he had upon his students, something that is poignantly highlighted in Gary Wills' recent remembrance of him in The New York Review of Books.  It is no accident that Bernard wrote the introductions to Robert Fagles' translation of the classics, since Fagles was a student of his at Yale who kept in close touch over the years--or that he made several appearances on the TV show hosted by Dick Cavett, also one of his students at Yale.

Bernard Knox was clearly a "man's man" and a child of his time.  Yet I remember a conversation during my year at the Center in which he expressed bitter revulsion at the way some of his colleagues at Yale treated female graduate students during his years there.  They were told, he said, that, although they were permitted to do graduate study at Yale, they should not expect to be recommended for jobs in the field, which were reserved for men.

Finally, Bernard Knox was someone who knew how to enjoy life's blessings.  I can still remember the excellent wines that were served the first time I was invited to dinner at the Director's residence.  In 1980 he invited me back to the Center to give a lecture, and I brought along a special bottle of wine to celebrate the occasion.  I can still hear him calling across the room that evening, overjoyed at the opportunity to enjoy something truly fine.

For all these reasons, and many others, I shall miss him, as will we all.

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Some Websites

Obituaries:

New York Times

Washington Post

Remembrances:

Glen W. Bowersock

Gary Wills

Bernard Knox, "Premature Anti-Fascist"

Getting What You Want: Queering Ancient Courtship

The Lambda Classical Caucus of the APA will sponsor a panel on "Queering Ancient Courtship" at the 2012 APA Annual meeting in Philadelphia.  Questions that individual papers might address include but are not limited to the following: What are the power dynamics of same-sex courtship?  What disciplinary and interpretive are well-suited to queering courtship?  How did traditions of courtship differ for same-sex couples?  How might queer perspectives illuminate heterosexual narratives?  What new light might queer approaches shed on familiar but non-normative heterosexual configurations?  What are the challenges, and benefits, of incorporating queer approaches in the classroom?  One page proposals, due by February 5, 2011, should be anonymous and adhere to APA guidelines for formatting abstracts. Please send submissions, as attached word documents, to Mary-Kay Gamel (mkgamel@ucsc.edu). They will be anonymously refereed. Questions may be addressed to the panel organizers (jpwood2@uncg.edu or hchristianblood@gmail.com).

Postcolonial Latin American Adaptations
of Greek and Roman Drama

Research on the reception of classical drama has focused on Europe,

Northern America, Africa, and Australasia, but has ignored, for no justifiable reason, Latin America.  Seeking to raise awareness about this important area of research, this APA panel -- the first of its kind to be organized at a national level -- solicits papers that examine case studies and approach the topic from a variety of theoretical and interdisciplinary perspectives.  Questions to be discussed include, but are not limited to, the following:  What is the artistic and sociohistorical context for these adaptations?  Are they direct derivates of the Greek or Roman original, or are there other texts or traditions involved in this hybridization?  Does this blending of classical themes with postcolonial experiences leave room for indigenous, mestizo, mulatto, or other mixed-race identities to be expressed?  Abstracts must be received in the APA office by February 1, 2011.  Please send an anonymous abstract as a PDF attachment to apameetings@sas.upenn.edu.  Be sure to mention the title of the panel and provide complete contact information and any AV requests in the body of your email. In preparing the abstract, please follow the APA's formatting guidelines for individual abstracts.  All submissions will be reviewed anonymously. Inquiries can be addressed to Konstantinos.Nikoloutsos@sju.edu.

Winkler Memorial Essay Competition

South Carolina Comp. Lit. Conference

The Center for Integrated Studies and the Department of Foreign Languages and Literature of the Johnson C. Smith University announce the 37th Southern Comparative Literature Association Conference.  This year's topic is "Meeting at the Crossroads: Mapping Worlds and World Literatures."  The conference will be held from September 29 - October 1, 2011, and the keynote speaker is Kwame Dawes.  Individual paper topics, panel proposals, round table proposals welcome.  Suggested topics include:  World Literature(s) in the Age of Globalization, Maps: Possibilities and Limitations, Crossroads and Cross-Pollination, Crossed Roads and Failed Meetings, Star-Crossed Encounters, World Literature of Other Worlds, Here Be Dragons: Encounters off the Map's Edge, Place Names and the Power of Names, Diasporas and Exiles, Mapping Bodies through Words, and Books and the Places They Go.  Abstracts should not exceed 250 words.  Send abstracts and proposals to Ms. Anika Pimentel (apimentel@jcsu.edu) or Dr. Adelheid R. Eubanks (aeubanks@jcsu.edu).  Submission deadline is May 6, 2011.

University College London Colloquium

The History Department of University College London announces a colloquium to be held on June 20, 2011: "West meets East: Contact and Interaction between India and the Mediterranean World from the Hellenistic period to Late Antiquity."  Abstracts are invited from postgraduate students who would like to present a paper related to any subject connected with relations between India and the Mediterranean World.  These include, but are not limited to: trade, religious exchang, early Christianity, diplomacy medicine, art.  This colloquium will provide students with the opportunity to present and discuss their research within the context of broader themes of contact between East and West.  The aim is to foster greater collaboration among those studying under the umbrella of East-West relations.  Please submit an abstract of about 300 words, together with a working title for your paper, to s.jansari@ucl.ac.uk.  The length of papers will be c. 20-30 minutes.  The deadline for submissions is Monday, 14th February 2011.

Classical Association of Canada Meeting

The Women's Network of the CAC invites submissions for a panel on "Women, Gender, and Law in the Ancient Mediterranean," to be held in Halifax NS, on 10-12 May 2011.  Proposals from a variety of methodological perspectives are welcome, including those of legal and social historians, literary critics, papyrologists, and experts in epigraphy.  Topics may address laws governing women's economic capacity, regulations on clothing and adornment, the representation of women in forensic oratory, the treatment of gender and law in literature, the legal status of prostitutes, social controls on sexual activity, women's access to the courts, legal remedies and benefits, and the relationship between gender, status and legal impediments.  Abstracts of no more than 300 words for proposed papers of 15-20 minutes in length should be submitted by January 21, 2011.  Please use the on-line abstract submission for the CAC Annual Meeting and indicate "Women's Network" panel at: http://cac-scechalifax2011.classics.dal.ca/index.php/CAC2011/CACHFX/schedConf/cfp.  For questions regarding the panel, please contact Fanny Dolansky (fdolansky@brocku.ca) or Judy Fletcher (jfletcher@wlu.ca).

APA Panel: The Recurring Plague in the Western Tradition

Plague narratives in the western literary tradition frequently dramatize the social bonds that are disrupted through processes of contagion.  While trying to reformulate common ground forsurvivors, narrative accounts of socially contracted disease often wrestle with realizations of the constructed nature of human values.  This panel considers the ways in which the ancient literary tradition - one that begins with the nosos afflicting the Achaean camp in Iliad 1 - revisits plague narratives as a means of both reflecting on political and social instability and formulating prospects for civic recovery.  Papers might address appropriation of nosological discourse within the parameters of antiquity and consider how culturally specific concerns shape the representation of disease and human responses to it.   Contributors are asked to consider the impact of these narratives on subsequent literary discourse.  Papers addressing representations of plague in films are also welcome.  Send anonymous abstracts to apameetings@sas.upenn.edu.  Follow APA formatting guidelines and list AV requests and contact information in the body of the email.  Deadline is February 1, 2011;

Tellus Magazine

Tellus is a magazine which celebrates contemporary poetry engaging with any aspect of the classical world.  It provides a space for established poets and up-and-coming authors, and aims to bring ancient civilizations to as wide an audience as possible through the accessible medium of fresh English poetry.  Issue 2 is due out in March 2011 and offers Virgil mixed with Bob Dylan, a disturbingly modern Galatea, a glimpse of how Homer really wrote the Iliad, a hymn to Hermes Enodios, and a focus section on the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice.  There will also be reviews of Seamus Heaney's recent Human Chain and Robert Saxton's rewriting of Hesiod into a sonnet sequence.  The issue also features an under-18 poetry competition on the motif of Orpheus and Eurydice.  Please see www.tellusmagazine.co.uk for more details.

Bryn Mawr Classics Colloquium

Bryn Mawr College sponsors weekly classics colloquia featuring distinguished speakers on a variety of literary, archeological and historical subjects.  Speakers for the spring term are:  January 28, Robin Mitchell-Boyask, "Odysseus, Maker of Horses."  February 4, Regina Höschele, "a virgo infelix: Calvus' Io vis-à-vis other Cow-and-Bull Stories."  February 11, Johannes Haubold, "The succession of empires - Greek and Mesopotamian perspectives."  February 18, Dirk Baltzly, "The theme (skopos) of a Platonic dialogue and the maintenance of textual communities in late antique Platonism."  February 25, Nathan Arrington, "Sacred Space and the Fallen Warrior: Death and Defeat on the Athenian Akropolis."  March 18, The C. Densmore Curtis Lecture, Barbara Barletta, "The Temple of Athena at Sounion."  March 2, Jose Gonzalez, "Aristotle on theoria."  April 1, The Agnes Michels Lecture, Kirk Freudenburg, "The Cinematography of Virgil's Aeneid."  April 8, "locus iste: Sacred Spaces, Divine Places in the Ancient World."  April 15, Jeremy McInerney, "The Gods of (Con)fusion: Athena Alea, Apollo Maleatas and Athena Aphaia."  Website: www.brynmawr.edu/classics/colloquia.html

Penn Classical Studies Colloquium

The University of Pennsylvania hosts its Classical Studies Colloquium on Thursdays at 4:30 in Cohen Hall 337 or 402.  Announced speakers for the spring term are:  March 17, Maria Iacovou, University of Cyprus, "The Parallel Lives of the Megalonisoi: The Political Geographies of Crete and Cyprus in the Bronze and Iron Ages (circa 3000-300 BC).  March 31, Marie-Claude Boileau, "Regionalism in Early Iron Age Crete: New Results from Ceramic Analysis."  April 14,? Christopher Stray, "Our Two Friends: the Making and Remaking of Liddell and Scott's Greek Lexicon."  April 21, Kathleen Coleman, "Born of Adamastor: The Classical Heritage in the Works of the South African Poet, Douglas Livingstone(1932-1996)."   Website: www.classics.upenn.edu/colloquia.html

In the elegant central court of The Newark Museum on October 8, CAAS's membership celebrated a milestone eight years in the making:  our first Jerry Clack Lecture.  Established by the Board in 2002, and thanks to the generosity of many of you, the Jerry Clack Lectureship Fund reached its $10,000 goal this year.  A matching grant challenge to the Board by Prof. Mervin R. Dilts (NYU emeritus) put the Fund over the top.  The Fund's purpose:  to bring a distinguished lecturer every year from outside the CAAS region to speak on some important aspect of ancient Greece or Rome.  The result:  the highlight of our 2010 Conference.

Prof. W. Robert Connor, Senior Advisor to and recent President of The Teagle Foundation, spoke on "We Must Call the Classics Before a Jury of the Shipwrecked: What Classics Can Do Now."   Adapting and expanding on a phrase from a 1932 essay of Ortega y Gasset, written as the Nazis threatened to take over Germany, Professor Connor expanded on three survivors of shipwreck who reintegrate themselves, and reconnect with their world, through texts:  Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, who finds peace as he reads a copy of the Bible he recovered from the wreckage of his ship;  Shakespeare's Prospero in The Tempest, whose library helps to inspire him to forgive his enemies;  and Dante, who is led by Vergil out of the metaphorical shipwreck of his middle years.  At a time when it may seem that "no one really cares," Professor Connor went on, the Classics give us arms with which to swim when we are drowning.  "This movement of the arms is culture-a swimming stroke."  And it is not enough to take in.  We swimmers interrogate the texts and create a dialogue with swimmers of times before our own.  One of our challenges as classicists and educators is to explore how, and under what circumstances, these transformative texts can unleash their power in our time.

I was inspired, not only by Professor Connor's thoughts, but by the rapt attention of the audience.  The museum's AV man leaned forward over the railing, his eyes riveted.  Afterwards, he expressed the hope that we can return another year with another such message.  Professor Connor's full lecture is online on his website:  http://www.wrobertconnor.com/classics-before-a-court.html.  We look forward to the prospect of a revised version of it in Classical World.

A special moment occurred after the lovely reception arranged by Executive Director, Mary Brown, as Jerry Clack took the microphone.Past CAAS President, editor of Classical World, Executive Director, and general guiding light for over three decades, Jerry's tireless services to CAAS and to Classics in our region make his the right name for this lectureship program.  It was a delight to hear Jerry pay tribute to CAAS officers and volunteers who had worked with him and witness to the continuity across the generations in our Association.

It was a delight to hear Jerry pay tribute to CAAS officers and volunteers who had worked with him and witness to the continuity across the generations in our Association.

We look forward to our second Jerry Clack Lecture next year from Professor Amy Richlin (UCLA). Keep your calendar free to attend on Friday evening, October 14, 2011, at our conference at the Baltimore Marriott in Hunt Valley, Maryland.