Reader in Classical Literature
- Greek and Latin literature, especially comedy
- theory and history of narrative
- the ancient book
- humour theory
- Greek religion.
I'm a fairly card-carrying formalist, which is a way of saying that most of my interests are driven by a curiosity about the ways in which literature, and other things, are shaped by underlying rules of structure and medium. I'm particularly interested in the application of this kind of approach to:
- narrative (classical and otherwise)
- the interface between cognitive science and literary theory
- humour studies
- technologies of text and reading
- theatre performance and history.
I also have a longstanding interest in historical fiction, in all media, about the ancient (particularly the Greek) world. Here's my listing of Greek historical fiction (last updated 19/9/06; sorry! – but big update imminent).
- The Imaginary History of Greece (on constructions of ancient Greece in modern fiction)
- new edition of G.W. Mooney (ed.),The Alexandra of Lycophron
- (tr.) Heliodorus, Aethiopica
- "Gilbert Murray and Psychic Research", in Christopher Stray (ed.), Gilbert Murray Reassessed: Hellenism, Theatre, & International Politics (OUP, 2007) 349-70
- "Epinikian Eidography", in Simon Hornblower & Catherine Morgan (edd.), Pindar's Poetry, Patrons, and Festivals: From Archaic Greece to the Roman Empire (OUP, 2007) 167-76
- "Aristophanic Spacecraft", in Lynn Kozak & John Rich (edd.), Playing around Aristophanes: Essays in Honour of Alan Sommerstein (Aris & Phillips, 2006) 48-64
- "Problematic Verrall: The Sceptic-at-Law", in Christopher Stray (ed.), The Owl of Minerva: The Cambridge Praelections of 1906 (PCPS Supplementary Volume 28, 2005) 142-60
- "Euripides" and "Lycophron", in Irene J.F. de Jong, Angus Bowie, & René Nünlist (edd.), Narrators, Narratees, and Narratives in Ancient Greek Literature (Brill, 2004) 269-80, 307-14
- "Metamorphoses of Genre in Fictions of Antiquity", in Kai Brodersen (ed.), Crimina: Der Antike im modernen Kriminalroman (Verlag Antike, 2004) 217-39
- "Comic Plots and the Invention of Fiction", in David Harvey and John Wilkins (edd.), The Rivals of Aristophanes (Duckworth/Classical Press of Wales, 2000) 259-72
- "Thesmophoria and Haloa: Myth, Physics, and Mysteries", in Sue Blundell and Margaret Williamson (edd.), The Sacred and the Feminine in Ancient Greece (Routledge, 1998) 149-73
- "Tragic and Homeric Ironies: Response to Rosenmeyer", in M.S. Silk (ed.), Tragedy and the Tragic: Greek Theatre and Beyond (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996) 520-33
- "Aristophanes' Books", Annals of Scholarship 10 (1993) 63-83
- "Sulpicia's Syntax", Classical Quarterly 38 (1988) 193-205
- "Greek Stagecraft and Aristophanes", in James Redmond (ed.) Themes in Drama 10: Farce (Cambridge, 1988) 33-52
- "Tragic Space and Comic Timing in Menander's Dyskolos", Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 24 (1987) 126-38.
I'm interested in most branches of Greek and Latin literature, but I'm particularly keen to supervise research on:
- formalistic approaches to ancient literature, especially narratology, semiotics, and cognitivism
- aspects of the history of ancient literature
- Greek drama (especially corpus-based approaches taking in the lost plays)
- aspects of the ancient book
- historical fiction (novels, films, or TV) about the ancient world
- Lycophron.
- In Our Time (BBC Radio 4) on Greek myth, 13 March 2008; listen online
- In Our Time on Greek & Latin love poetry, 26 April 2007; listen online
- Today (BBC Radio 4), 4 January 2007 (on Mafia Latin)
- Today, 17 August 2006 (on poetry translation)
- In Our Time (BBC Radio 4) on Greek comedy, 13 July 2006; listen online
- Mary Renault: Love and War in Ancient Greece (BBC4, 18 April 2006)
- Woman's Hour (BBC Radio 4), 18 April 2006 (on Phaedra)
- Lost in Egypt: Decoding the Papyri (BBC4, 1 February 2006)
- Front Row (BBC Radio 4), 8 April 2005 (on the RSC Hecuba)
- Alex James' Musical Odyssey (BBC World Service), 21 & 28 February 2005 (magical mythical tour of vaguely classically-themed musical oddities with that bloke out of Blur)
- CL1530A Greek Literature
First-year course, spanning a millennium of Greek literature from Homer to Heliodorus. Now available in an electronic version as part of the University of London External BA in Classics.
- CL2436B Homer (in translation)
Second-and-third-year course on the Iliad and Odyssey. All singing & dancing e-version now available as part of the London e-degree.
- CL2442B Greek Drama
Second-and-third-year course.
- CL3431B Roman Drama
Third-year course on Plautus, Terence, and Seneca.
- CL1755C Beginners' Latin
Ab initio language course, run vice Professor J.G.F. Powell.
- CL1726B Greek Language & Reading
A third-level language course.
- CL5011 The Ancient Novel (MA course)
Postgraduate course on Greek and Roman prose fiction.
- CL5812 Three Greek Plays
Postgraduate course on Greek tragedy.
(most of these need a data projector)
- "The Structure of the Odyssey"
Sovereign Education, Birmingham, 29 April 2009
- "Lysistrata: Desperate Housewives Season Zero"
Greenwood Theatre, 11 February 2009
- "The Cloudspotter's Guide to Comedy Ancient and Modern"
Bridewell Theatre, 26 March 2009
- "Write your Own Greek Tragedy"
Clifton College, 2 February 2007
Nottingham Classical Association, 24 June 2009
- "Dramatic Festivals at Athens"
Sovereign Education, Manchester, 18 November 2008
- "What Makes a Greek Tragedy?"
Fettes College, 16 September 2008
- "Greek Tragedy: The Missing 98%"
Godolphin & Latymer Breakfast Club, 13 June 2008
- "The End of the Odyssey"
Reading Classical Association, 21 May 2008
- "Tales from the Script: The Untold Stories behind the New Hollywood Classics"
Royal Grammar School, Guildford, 16 October 2007
King's College London Classics Society, 13 November 2007
- "Why the Greeks Didn't Invent the Bicycle"
Hereford Cathedral School, 13 October 2006
- "From Aristophanes to Menander"
Sovereign Education, 14 March 2007
- "Structure and Stagecraft in Wasps"
Sovereign Education, London, 15 March 2006
- "Mythography Ancient and Modern"
ARLT, 4 March 2006
other talks available (a selection):
- War Stories: The Iliad and the Plotting of Battle
- Staging the Epic: From Homer to Tragedy
- Stagecraft in Medea (or any other Greek tragedy, by request)
- What happens in Pseudolus (or any other Roman comedy, by request)
- Tragedy and Cinema: Parallel Lives
- other topics on Homer, tragedy, comedy by request
- You can download Orbilius, a free Latin program for Macintosh (currently Classic only; fix in progress) or Windows.
- And here's a page of documentation and resources for the classic Macintosh outliner and presentation program MORE.
- I do a bi-monthly film review column for Interzone. Nevertheless, it's a great magazine. Subscribe now.
- I edited Folo Graff's wonderful book African Guitar Styles (ADG Productions, 2001). Folo is a brilliant guitarist and teacher from Sierra Leone, based in London. If you'd like to know more about his classes, here's his advert.
Erm, yes, I get asked this a lot. You mean:
- the thing I use to take notes on?
It's a CyKey keyboard, talking to a Palm via infra-red. It uses the superbly elegant and ergonomic Microwriting seven-key touch-typing system devised in the seventies by the great Cy Endfield, a Hollywood blacklist fugitive who fled to the UK where, among much else, he directed a young Sean Connery in the classic British trucking movie Hell Drivers (1957); later credits included directing and co-writing Zulu. The alphabet takes about 20 minutes to learn, though it takes a couple of weeks' preferential use to get up to a speed where you can feel it being appreciably quicker than handwriting. It's not as fast as qwerty, but I find a resting speed of 40 wpm is comfortable and 55 perfectly possible in bursts if you're trying to keep up with something. It's so simple, clever, and effective that I've never understood why it hasn't conquered the world. When I say this to people they smile indulgently as if too polite to point out what I'll never be able to see.
- the teeny-tiny PowerBook in a black leather bun?
That's a Zaurus, made by Sharp for the Japanese market, running the 68k Macintosh emulator Basilisk II. The Zaurus is a micro-laptop, somewhere between a Psion and an OQO, and runs Linux. Mine is an SL-C3100, since superseded by the 3200; I use it inter alia as a virtual pocket Mac mimicking my much-loved PowerBook Duo 280c, comprehensively trashed six years ago by Irish baggage handlers. More info on my Basilisk-on-Zaurus page.
Once and for all, I am NO RELATION to any of the following: anyone talented of the same name; Christopher (J.C.B.) Lowe, my more distinguished former London colleague who also works on New Comedy; the character at the end of The Sot-Weed Factor; a divorced father who appeared on a TV documentary a few years back complaining about the Child Support Agency; the defeated Natural Law Party candidate for Wrexham; a Buddhist monk from Wigan, Lancs last heard of in Thailand in 1995. My colleagues Richard Alston, Richard Hawley, and Peter Howell, however, are the same as, respectively, the noted choreographer; the former Pulp guitarist AND the star of Channel 5's soap Family Affairs and the memorably scary advertisement for Thompson Roof Seal; and the new-age recording artist billed by his CD cover as "radiant – inspiring – pure." Marry a scientist. Worked for me.
Back to Royal Holloway Classics Home Page
Nick Lowe
n.lowe@rhul.ac.uk
last updated 21/2/09
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