Very happy to announce that The Classical Quarterly has appointed Dr Thomas Biggs (Lecturer in Latin at the University of St Andrews) as a new editor. Dr Biggs joins Patrick Finglass, Costas Panayotakis and myself as co-editor of CQ. Official announcement here: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

Registration for @hellenicsociety.bsky.social and Roman Societies' next online course, with Professor Bruce Gibson, The Idea of Decline: Make Rome Great Again? is now open here: www.hellenicandromanlibrary.org/Events/Event... Wednesday 14, 21, 28 January, 4, 11 February, 6-7.30pm (UK time)

The horrors persist but so do I, but also could the horrors like. slow down perhaps

Had a thoroughly lovely time chatting all things Cicero, trauma, and civil war! Thanks very much for having me 🙏🏻

The very best view 💙

Spent the weekend in the office to finish A Thing after a week with very little sleep. Now very tired, but also rather more excited about research than I had expected to be. Interesting 🤔

On 30 October will be welcoming Dr Elaine Sanderson @elainam42.bsky.social (Liverpool) for a research seminar on 'Re-Making Memories: Reading Trauma and Recovery in Cicero’s Civil War Letters', 17:15-18:30 UK time. The talk will be hybrid (details in the thread). All very welcome to attend!

Very tired, so much to do, please send coffee... 😬

Oh for gods sake, we're asking about strikes again, at expense of the members, at a time when we really need to focus on so many other things. I suppose when you only have a hammer, everything looks like a nail. The perpetual, tedious cries for a strike really don't help at all

Just magic to round off a day of writing playing chukkas with Bish again 💙 It's been a long year of injuries and setbacks, but we made it just in time for the end of the season!

'Fewer graduates regret going to university than is widely assumed and the public have a more favourable view of universities than people imagine, according to new research.' 1/3

We did a little thing! So proud of Bishy 💙

💙

This is very bad. Although entirely predictable. Once more the humanities are being cut back to prop up STEM and, increasingly, AI investment (including at the expense of bench science). In the past, cuts to humanities were promoted on two separate logic streams that do not hold true: /1

Back behind the best ears 💙

You did and it’s ok. Good morning! 🩷

Bye Coimbra 👋🏻 Thank you Sanne, Edward, and Pablo for organising a splendid panel, and to all fellow panelists for such engaging and inspiring discussions on a range of Greco-Roman historical narratives! #CCC25

How do you ensure a nation fails to cope with drought? Privatise its water system. Almost everyone wants our water renationalised. Almost everyone, that is, except the government. This week's column. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Now in sunny Coimbra to think about textual engagement and reader experience in Greco-Riman historical narratives! ☺️ #CCC2025

Conference de-brief with Bishy after a lovely few days back up at @staclassics.bsky.social for #CA2025 💙

Decades of mechanistic talk about university degrees as if they were bundles of 'skills' and 'prep' are about to be proved completely wrong (obviously). Want to get a real boost? Do History or English.

Looking forward to discussing fun things on silence in Latin lit tomorrow morning with @nicolettabruno1288.bsky.social, @helenlovatt.bsky.social, and @lemonamarshall.bsky.social! #CA2025

Emotions of Crisis workshop now underway at @livancworlds.bsky.social! Prof. Douglas Cairns of @edinclassics.bsky.social kicking off the day with the keynote: 'Between Anarchy and Despotism: Fear, Anxiety, and Their Antidotes in Greek Thought' #EmotionsOfCrisis

Posing for the camera > looking where you're meant to be going 😅

"I asked ChatGPT" "I asked Grok" ok well I asked Gandalf and he said he has not passed through fire and death to bandy crooked words with a witless worm

Delightful day of research things. Such a joy to have time to think 🙂

Off to Warwick to talk about some nice(ish) things in Lucan! Thanks for the invitation @joewatstein.bsky.social 😊

Men are extremely keen to explain to me that Britain *needs* a domestic steel production plant and doesn't necessarily *need* universities. Okay. Steel contributed about £1.7bn to the UK economy in 2024. Universities contributed more than £200bn.

[falling down a cliff] parkourrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Stick and balling at snail's pace. With obstacles 😅

ClassicsBluesky 🏺🧵 #LatinForTheDay – 28 May #Seneca “dum terra caelum media libratum feret, nitidusque certas mundus evolvet vices, numerusque harenis derit, et solem dies, noctem sequentur astra, dum siccas polus versabit Arctos, flumina in pontum cadent,...

Wild when you consider it is likely cheaper to simply … hire a human copy editor

ClassicsBluesky 🏺🧵 #LatinForTheDay – 25 May #Seneca “post haec avari Ditis apparet domus. hic saevus umbras territat Stygius canis, qui trina vasto capita concutiens sono regnum tuetur. sordidum tabo caput lambunt colubrae, viperis horrent iubae longusque torta sibilat cauda draco....

Gary Linekar is better off without the muzzled BBC. Refusing to call this a genocide should be as unacceptable and illegal as Holocaust denial, the BBC are 100% complicit.

Only allowed to do light work for the next few weeks, but it's great to be back in the saddle! 💙

22 and fabulous, covered in Birthday dinner 🤤

Today, Monday isn't terrible.

Can't remember who said it, but using ChatGPT for your college essays is like using a forklift to move the weights around at the gym. It's the process that's important to your development, not the end product.

Handing over academic institutional leadership to a roving class of elite administrators, none remaining in place long, just climbing ladders and cashing checks … was a mistake,

F r o l i c 💃🏻

Guess how many permanent HE jobs there are in History in the entirety of the United Kingdom right now. Three: that's right, three. One at Oxford, one at Cambridge, one at UCL. We have got to totally change the way we still see PhD training and numbers. www.jobs.ac.uk/search/histo...

Lucan, Tacitus, and Dream Theater. Show me a better Monday, I'll wait... 😉

Roman cavalry horse cemetery found in Stuttgart – The History Blog 🏺 #ClassicsBluesky #BlueskyClassics #AncientBluesky 🏛️ www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/72953

Falling through pages of Martens on angels

Special moment this afternoon 💙

Keeping out of mischief ✍🏻

Call for abstracts closes on Friday! The Emotions of Crisis: Ancient and Modern Concepts, Perspectives, and Solutions (an interdisciplinary workshop) liverpool.ac.uk/archaeology-... @livunihss.bsky.social @livancworlds.bsky.social @sotauol.bsky.social

Bishy smoosh 💙

Little serving of moretum for the intermediate Latinists this morning 😋