Call for Papers:
“A Memory More Powerful than Lethe’s Shores: New Approaches to Lucan’s Bellum Civile”
University of California, Davis
May 15 and 16, 2025
In the third book of Lucan’s Bellum Civile, Pompey is visited in a dream by a vision of his deceased wife. Furious that her husband remarried after her passing, Julia threatens future vengeance: “The oblivion of Lethe’s shores, husband, has not made me forgetful of you” (me non Lethaeae, coniunx, obliuia ripae/inmemorem fecere tui, 3.28-29). The idea that an emotion or remembrance can be so powerful as to make it impossible to forget – even when faced with the powers of the river Lethe – captures the effect that Lucan himself and his controversial poem have had since the 1st century CE.
This workshop aims to offer a forum in which Lucan’s work can be considered holistically in these terms – as a multifaceted and deeply impactful work whose relevance has only grown in recent years. As global anxieties surrounding political division and how the present and future can confront the challenges of the past have expanded in scale and complexity, for example, one might consider the Bellum Civile’s sorrowful raging, bitter reproach, and energetic demand to be heard especially timely. In order to explore widely the new avenues contemporary perspectives bring to the fore – and to confront head-on the rich and often contradictory multiplicity readers of Lucan have identified across various aspects of his poem – we welcome papers on any aspect of the Bellum Civile. We look forward to uncovering what new ideas and approaches come to light by examining the poem from multiple angles in a wide-ranging discussion.
The workshop will be held on Thursday, May 15 and Friday, May 16, 2025 at the University of California, Davis Bodega Marine Laboratory, located in Bodega Bay, California; accommodations and meals during the event will be provided. Our two-day conversation will be dialogic in structure, with each paper paired with a respondent whose remarks will provide a bridge to collective discussion. Papers should be 35 minutes in length.
Confirmed respondents include:
Neil Bernstein (Ohio University)
Timothy Joseph (College of the Holy Cross)
Francesca Martelli (UCLA)
Ellen Oliensis (UC Berkeley)
Stefano Rebeggiani (USC)
Andrew Zissos (UC Irvine)
Those interested should submit anonymized titles and abstracts of up to 300 words to both Kathleen Cruz (kancruz@ucdavis.edu) and Carey Seal (cseal@ucdavis.edu) by December 15, 2024; decisions will be shared by early January. Inquiries about the event may also be directed to either Dr. Cruz or Dr. Seal.
