My paper on the potential use of poisoned wines as methods of assassination in the court of Elagabalus has been accepted for the Colloquia Ceranea conference at the University of Łódź, Poland in May. First trip to Poland!

Teaching my favourite book of the Aeneid: volvitur Euryalus leto, pulchrosque per artus it cruor inque umeros cervix conlapsa recumbit: purpureus veluti cum flos succisus aratro languescit moriens, lassove papavera collo demisere caput pluvia cum forte gravantur.

And at long last the end is in sight.

Morning.

Goodnight

Morning!

Morning!

Conference finished. Excellent speakers and definite plans to move forward on a project with real potential for transformative results.

All kicking off on the train in the seat behind me. Police been called for next station.

Off to Durham to give a paper at a conference tomorrow on approaches to teaching Greek tragedy within the prison system. A return to Durham has been long overdue!

Marking essays about land reform in the late Roman Republic on a very old and very slow train that is full of rubbish and smells strongly of urine. Living the dream.

What? youtu.be/qF3oytxj8Ac

Putting the finishing touches to my session on the art of Van Gogh for my online OU teaching tomorrow. I like the fact that sometimes I get to teach non-Classical stuff, especially if it is art or architectural history. I can generally sneak something in about Caravaggio or Brutalism.

I shall make this tonight. www.theguardian.com/food/2026/fe...

Time to start thinking about my paper for this year’s CA conference: Augustan coinage, the inscription on the Arch of Titus and this from the Temple of Isis at Philae in Egypt.

Back to translating sections of Cicero’s Pro Roscio. Current mood.

I like to imagine that this is what the Forum of Augustus was meant to look like.

Goodnight.

Lecture recorded and Durham paper mostly finished. That surely deserves Barolo?

Definitely not a fan of Neoclassical architecture, but I’ll make one exception.

This morning I’m recording a short lecture on Cicero’s consulship for a project I’m involved with. Needless to say, I shall be giving him a right old kicking, including his woeful poetry on the subject.

Morning.

No teaching this week but a stack of university marking, a conference paper to finish, catching up with friends and back to learning conversational Arabic again.

First draft of my Durham paper on teaching Greek tragedy in prisons has avoided any references to Foucault but has one to J.G. Ballard's Crash. Hopefully it will make it to the finished version.

Goodnight.

Virgil would have been pleased. www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Sunday morning online OU session: 90 minutes on Cleopatra.

Writing an abstract for a conference in Sicily in September. It would act as a companion piece to the paper I’m giving at Durham next month on teaching Greek tragedy in prisons, but more focussed on tragedy as part of the process of healing trauma in antiquity.

2 years ago today I was in Rome,showing A level students around the Ara Pacis, the Mausoleum and the Pantheon. One of them,unsure as to what she would study at university, decided that day that Classics was the subject for her.She’s now at Cambridge studying Classics with Latin.

That's a wrap on the teaching. Negroni time!

I’ve hit the teaching jackpot this weekend: Friday night, Saturday morning,Sunday morning.

Thought for the day: Rome may have seven hills, but Barnstaple has five industrial estates.

A grim commute with 90mi plus journey each way on replacement bus. Thankfully an end to this awfulness is in sight.

Young Sick Bacchus https://www.wikiart.org/en/caravaggio/young-sick-bacchus

Yikes. I’m running a 90 minute online OU academic writing workshop on Friday evening and currently have 128 people signed up for it.

Tentative start to writing my paper on teaching Greek tragedy in prisons for the conference in Durham.

Once again, cold,dark and unpleasant. And that's just me.

Goodnight

Train issues AGAIN. Oh well,the end is in sight.

Morning.