THE ANCIENTS HAD ALREADY SPOKEN ABOUT ALL THAT…

Edited by Prof. Kalogeropoulos.

We often nowadays have the impression that our modern society encounters different situations from those in antiquity. Different lifestyles, different interpersonal relationships, different institutions and technologies. The truth though is the issues that we are faced with today are not that different to the ones our ancestors faced in ancient times.
Then why do we still only search for modern texts in order to deal with actuality?
The word “actuality” is derived from the Latin verb ago which means “to lead, to guide, to bring”, and actuality cannot only speak of what is contemporary but should be an actualis (practical) fact that guides us towards the understanding of our century. Besides, the Greeks and Romans had talked about everything!
Through historical, scientific, epistolary texts, poems, plays and fables, famous and other less known texts, from Homer to Virgil, from Aesop to Phaedrus, passing through Apuleius, Hesiod, Sophocles and Plutarch, we will read what the Ancients wrote about universal themes and timeless topics.
On our literary journey through antiquity, we will compare Greek and Latin writings of the same author but also others of different eras, translated into Italian, on topics such as the pandemic and man’s impotence, the importance of friendship, authority and power, the education of young people, discrimination and bullying, the female fashion, exile and immigration, the fundamental values of social life, ecology and environmental pollution.
Each of the proposed readings will be the starting point for a conversation on topics relevant to our everyday lives, because indeed “the Ancients had already spoken about all that…”.

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Conversation Course Details

The goal of these lessons is to carry out a targeted Conversational Course based on Italian translations of carefully selected extracts from classic Latin and Greek works.