Emily Wilson
My paper will explore the ways that various forms of writing that are not looked on particularly kindly by tenure committees and are often treated as marginal and “unscholarly” -- such as various genres that I have worked in, including reviews, trade books, translations, blogs and anthologies -- play an essential role in communicating the literature, history and cultures of Graeco-Roman antiquity to audiences beyond departments of classical studies, and also beyondthe academy. My central goals in all these very different kinds of writing are to invite both classicists and non-classicists to consider the ways that the worlds of antiquity were similar to, and different from, our own cultures; to build dialogue between these different sets of readers; to encourage a more reflective approach to contemporary culture through the counterpoint of the ancient world; and to point directions that our own culture might be revitalized by new engagements with the past. I hope to encourage the SCS audience to reconsider the marginalization of these kinds of bridge writings within the mainstream of classical studies, and to make a case for their central importance within our discipline.