Reimagining Ancient Greece and Rome: APGRD public lectures: Recent Episodes
Oxford University
Recordings of the lectures and in-conversation events with acclaimed actors, directors, playwrights, and academics, on modern and historic performances inspired by ancient Greek and Roman texts - hosted by the Archive of Performances of Greek and Roman Drama (University of Oxford Classics Faculty).
Naomi Weiss delivers a public lecture on Kamila Shamsie's award-winning novel, Home Fire Naomi Weiss (Gardner Cowles Associate Professor of the Humanities, Harvard University), talks on Kamila Shamsie’s retelling of Sophocles' Antigone, Home Fire (published by Bloomsbury, 2017; winner of the Women's Prize for Fiction 2018). Streamed live on the APGRD YouTube channel on Monday 15 February 2021, and followed by a live Q&A with the online audience, with questions submitted via YouTube chat and email.
Rosa Andújar delivers a talk on the work of the award-winning playwright Luis Alfaro Streamed live on the APGRD YouTube channel on Monday 18 January 2021, Dr Rosa Andújar (KCL) talked about the award-winning Chicanx adaptations of Greek tragedy by writer, theatre director, social activist, and MacArthur Fellow, Luis Alfaro. Alfaro's Electricidad, Oedipus El Rey and Mojada transplant themes of Electra, Oedipus the King, and Medea into 21st-century Los Angeles, giving voice to the concerns of the Chicanx and wider Latinx communities. The Greek Trilogy of Luis Alfaro: Electricidad; Oedipus El Rey; Mojada, edited by Rosa Andújar, was published by Bloomsbury in 2020. The lecture was followed by a live Q&A with the online audience, with questions submitted via YouTube chat and email.
Edith Hall and Henry Stead in conversation about their book, A People’s History of Classics: Class and Greco-Roman Antiquity in Britain and Ireland 1689 to 1939 Edith Hall (KCL) and Henry Stead (St Andrews) were live-streamed on the APGRD YouTube channel at 2pm on Monday 23 November 2020 to present and discuss their new book, A People's History of Classics: Class and Greco-Roman Antiquity in Britain and Ireland 1689 to 1939 (Routledge, 2020). The conversation was followed by a live Q&A with the online audience, with questions submitted via YouTube chat and email.
Alena Sarkissian gives public lecture, subtitled 'Theatre as a space of Spiritual Contemplation', on Greek Tragedy in the Czech Republic under Nazi Occupation.
Nur Laiq (TORCH Global South Visiting Fellow), Hal Scardino (producer) and Fiona Macintosh (APGRD) discuss We Are Not Princesses, a documentary about Syrian women living as refugees in Beirut telling their stories through the ancient Greek play, Antigone.
The annual Classics & English lecture given in May 2019: Isobel Hurst (Goldsmiths) discusses Edith Wharton and the Classics.
An APGRD public lecture given in May 2019: Henry Power (Exeter) discusses Homeric resonances in the work of Alexander Pope, John Keats, and Thom Gunn.
An APGRD / DANSOX public lecture given in February 2019: Olga Taxidou (Edinburgh) discusses the work of Isadora Duncan and Edward Gordon Craig.
An APGRD public lecture in October 2017: Nancy Sorkin Rabinowitz (Hamilton College) tells us about her work bringing Classics into prisons.
An APGRD public lecture given in April 2018: Peter Wilson (Sydney) discusses the relationship between Greek theatre and politics.
An APGRD / DANSOX public seminar given in November 2018: Nicole Haitzinger (Salzburg) discusses Noverre's use of gesture and the tragic.
An APGRD public lecture from March 2018: Erika Fischer-Lichte (Freie Universität Berlin) speaks on the subject of her recent book, Tragedy's Endurance.
Poet, classical translator, research scholar and literary critic, Josephine Balmer reads from her latest collection, The Paths of Survival - inspired by the surviving fragments of Aeschylus's lost tragedy, Myrmidons. This reading is followed by a discussion with Josephine Balmer, Laura Swift, and Oliver Taplin.
Created by APGRD Artist in Residence Marie-Louise Crawley Marie-Louise Crawley spent six months in 2017 as Artist in Residence at the Archive of Performances of Greek and Roman Drama (APGRD). Her residency gave rise to the creation and performance of the solo durational dance work Likely Terpsichore? Fragments, performed and filmed in the Ashmolean museum. The work takes its inspiration from a marble sculpture in the museum, labelled 'likely Terpsichore, the muse of the dance', and draws on the stories of four female characters from myth (Galatea, Myrrha, Philomela and Medusa). It also formed the practice submission element of Marie-Louise's doctoral thesis, undertaken at the Centre for Dance Research (C-DaRE) at Coventry University.
The Abbey Theatre's artistic director Wayne Jordan talks to Professor Fiona Macintosh, about his acclaimed 2015 production of Sophocles' Oedipus.
Professor Ruth Webb (Université Charles-de-Gaulle Lille III), examines attitudes towards tragedy from the Second Sophistic to Late Antiquity An APGRD Public Lecture from November 2016
Acclaimed playwright Frank McGuinness talks with Fiona Macintosh about his work adapting Greek tragedies for modern theatre, particularly Antigone and Medea.
Theatre director Jonathan Kent discusses his work with Greek tragedies, including Medea with Diana Rigg in 1992-1994; Hecuba with Clare Higgins in 2004; and Oedipus with Ralph Fiennes in 2008 at the National Theatre.
Director, Adele Thomas, and playwright / translator, Rory Mullarkey, talk about their production of Aeschylus' Oresteia at the Globe Theatre, London in 2015
David Scourfield, of Maynooth University, discusses E. M. Forster's relationship with Greek tragedy in the APGRD's second, annual Classics and English Lecture
Director Ian Rickson talks about his 2014 production of Sophocles' Electra at the Old Vic, London, starring Kristin Scott Thomas as Electra
Playwright Marina Carr discusses her adaptation of Euripides' Hecuba, which premiered at the RSC in 2015, and her long-standing relationship with Greek Tragedy The event began with Marina reading from her new Hecuba, and unfortunately a microphone-failure means that this portion of the podcast is very faint. The audio quality significantly improves for the in-conversation section.
Poet and playwright, Gwyneth Lewis discusses her relationship with Greek tragedy and her play Clytemnestra.
Helen McCrory talks about her title role in the acclaimed 2014 production of Euripides' Medea at the National Theatre