Outreach
The Classics department organizes a variety of events with a classical slant that engage significant interest, extending well beyond undergraduates with Classics majors or minors.
Past events co-sponsored by Weinberg, the Kaplan Institute and the Alumnae of Northwestern include:
- “Ancient Rome in Silent Cinema.” Silent Film Screening with live piano accompaniment followed by a lecture by Professor Maria Wyke (University College London) [Fall 2016]
- An all-night marathon reading of Homer’s Iliad on the lakefront of the Evanston campus. The Homer-athon kicked off with an event, titled “A Night with the Iliad,” in which Northwestern faculty and students from different departments read excerpts of the poem in English and nine other languages. Despite cold temperatures, “The Iliad by Moonlight” attracted about 100 classics lovers and had extensive press coverage, including the Weinberg Magazine (Fall/Winter 2014).
- The Deering Library event “ Light installation, Reading and ‘The poetry Way’” organized by Kaplan Institute artist in residence Marco Nereo Rotelli where a chorus of Latin students chanted the hexameters of the Latin poet Ennius. [Spring 2013]
- “Socrates Now,” a theatrical recreation of Plato’s Apology by Emmy Award winner Yannis Simonides which was attended by more than 350 people. [Fall 2013]
- Public reading of Greek and Latin poems translated by NU undergraduate students enrolled in Latin 201-3 and Greek 201-3 with masked performance by professional actors. [Spring 2010]
- “Comedy in the Piazza,” an interdisciplinary round-table discussion with performance which explored the millennial history of the piazza as the setting for comic theatre in the Italian peninsula from the Greeks to the 19th Century. [Fall 2008]