Poets, Friends, Lovers: Intimate Lyric Worlds

Undergraduate

offers an introduction to lyric poetry in ancient Greece and Rome, as well as later poetry influenced by classical lyric. Lyric focused on the intimate experiences of the poet’s life, making it the ancestor of the personal poetry of today. It explored small things that often resonated in wider ways. From the loves of Sappho in Archaic Greece to Horace’s reflections on the quiet life in Imperial Rome, this course examines how ancient poets fashioned their identities and made sense of their often turbulent times.