The Gaisford Lecture 2023, A. Purves, ‘In the Depths: Homer and the Underwater Imaginary’

in the depths

The Gaisford Lecture for 2023 will be given by Professor Alex Purves, from the University of California, Los Angeles. It will take place at 5.00 p.m. on Thursday 15 June, in the Ioannou Centre, 66 St Giles’, Oxford.

Professor Purves’s title is:

In the Depths: Homer and the Underwater Imaginary

Alex Purves, Gaisford Lecture   Thursday 15 June, Lecture Theatre, Ioannou Centre, 66 St Giles’ OX1 3LU (and online)

A summary:

This lecture examines the Iliad and related texts from an underwater perspective. It considers how thinking through the medium of seawater opens up various poetic and narrative possibilities for epic, including the notion of a ‘submarine Iliad’ that runs counter to that poem’s heroic and martial emphasis. 

All are extremely welcome to the lecture, and to the drinks that will follow it.

The lecture can also be watched remotely:

https://ox.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=e633bf1e-f72a-4e9b-a253-aff700c31e95