Graduate Student, Department of Classics and Ancient History
University of London, Birkbeck College, Department of History, Classics & Archaeology
University College London, Greek and Latin
PhD Student
Thesis Title: The Odyssey in Children's Literature
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Prof. Barbara Graziosi
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About
For generations, the study of Homer has been considered an essential part of a literate education and adaptations of the Odyssey have often been considered particularly suitable introductions for children. However, when the hero succeeds by lying, having affairs, maiming monsters and slaughtering humans, presenting this to modern children as ‘heroic’ becomes problematic. By mapping the use of the Odyssey in children’s literature I hope to explore the impact that particular social and educational mores have upon its reception.
The project’s aims are twofold; first, to conduct a literary survey into adaptations of the Odyssey as encountered by children from its use in ancient school education until c.1800 A.D. For the next part of my project, I will focus on post-1800 adaptations in English, as children’s literature was becoming a distinct genre during the late-eighteenth/early-nineteenth centuries. By exploring both paedagogical and recreational contexts, I will investigate how social anxieties regarding material for children shape reaction to a text that was considered so culturally significant and yet seemed and was, in some respects, inappropriate. Some of the areas I intend to explore include the transmission of social values through literature, questions regarding role models and exemplary behaviour, and the construction of childhood in society. In turn, these issues will raise questions concerning the tactics which children’s authors use to deal with problematic material, which often include presenting selected excerpts, summarizing without detail and the use of allegory and edifying methods. By addressing these issues, I hope that this project will shed some light on why the Odyssey is often the first encounter with Homer for both classicists and non-classicists, and on how that encounter is socially engineered.
