The third Week of the Classics will take place from Wednesday 14 to Sunday 25 April. Time to dive into the Classics again… and choose your favorite Classic.
As part of the third Week of the Classics, the History &Archeology editors of Kennislink have once again listed a number of Classics. We invite you to choose your favorite Classic from these Classics. You can vote at the bottom of this page. By casting your vote you have an immediate chance to win the Classics Since the foundation of the city of Livy, Emperors of Rome by Suetonius, The ideal state by Plato, Odyssey and Iliad by Homer and The Jewish War &Out of My Life by Flavius Josephus and the gift booklet Charisma by Imme Dros.
There is no greater hero than Odysseus, the protagonist and namesake of the most important heroic epic in world literature. He had charisma, just like Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, but to an intensified degree.
Homer's Odysseus comes from a time when humans were bigger, more heroic, and stronger than ever since. He is a complicated man, with more good than bad qualities, but that picture changes in later centuries. In the hands of writers like Sophocles and Virgil, he turns into a predictable, two-dimensional figure, an opportunist, liar and trickster.
Imme Dros follows that changing image, up to Dante, Shakespeare and Vondel. Slowly he deteriorates, and his adventures become those of a b-actor in a soap opera. Because, she writes, 'people need gods, writers need villains'.
Athenaeum-Polak &Van Gennep Publishers and Ambo Publishers present five packages with the Classics Since the city was founded of Livy, Emperors of Rome by Suetonius, The ideal state by Plato, Odyssey and Iliad by Homer and The Jewish War &Out of My Life by Flavius Josephus and the gift booklet Charisma van Imme Dros available to raffle among the people who vote for their favorite Classic. So scroll down quickly to the nominated books below to cast your vote! 1
Read more about this gift booklet on the website of the Week of the Classics
1 Employees of NEMO and Kennislink are excluded from participation. You can vote until April 26, 2010. Only the winners will receive a personal message by e-mail. There will be no correspondence about the result.
Since the foundation of the city
by Livy
Rome… the Eternal City, the beating heart of the Roman Empire. According to legend, Romulus and Remus founded the city in 753 BC. No other writer or historian gives such a comprehensive and exciting account as Livy. In the anthology Since the foundation of the city Livy tells of the earliest history of the small settlement that grew into the most powerful empire in the world. The rape of the Sabine virgins, Hannibal's journey across the Alps, the massacre at Lake Trasumen, the scandal surrounding the Bacchanalia in Rome… all are discussed.- Jorg Rousseeuw
Emperors of Rome
by Suetonius
Did you know that Caesar wore a laurel wreath to hide his baldness? Augustus had all his paintings updated? Tiberius stuffed his palace with porn? Nero set Rome on fire and killed his pregnant wife, his mother, his stepbrother and his teacher? Caligula wanted to appoint his horse consul? In Emperors of Rome Suetonius examines twelve emperors, from Julius Caesar (44 B.C.) to Domitian (96 A.D.). Systematically and clinically, he describes their personality and behavior in public and at home. A lecture full of tasty anecdotes and spicy details from which some emperors emerge as truly great men of Roman history, while we get to know others in all their vulgarity, backstabbing, cowardice or sadism… - Jorg Rousseeuw
The ideal state
by Plato
Does crime make you happy? Does it pay to break the law that goes unpunished? Not according to Plato. In addition to arguing about the immoral life, Plato outlines in The ideal state the psychological theory in which he distinguishes five types of people:from the balanced intellectual to the dictatorial addict. The five types of political theories run parallel to the five types of people:at the top the harmonious ideal state, at the bottom the completely derailed dictatorial society. Life is a profession. A profession that you can learn and teach. Only those who have successfully completed this education gain political power:the harmoniously developed scientists. They are the guardians of norms and values.- Jorg Rousseeuw
Odyssey
by Homer
Odysseus, the haunted Greek hero from the Iliad, wanders for ten years after the fall of Troy before he sees his wife, son and homeland again. During his wanderings he experiences the wildest adventures. Odyssey tells of the nymph Kalypso, who imprisoned the Greek hero for seven years in her cave, of the girl Nausikaa, who finds him exhausted on the beach of the Phaeacians, the Lotos-eaters, the cyclops Polyphemos, whose eye is horribly cut by Odysseus about the sorceress Circe, who turns all his friends into swine, about the blind seer Teuresias in the underworld, about his wife Penelope and her intrusive suitors and his son Telemachus, who waits until he can take revenge with his father, with a horrific massacre… - Jorg Rousseeuw
Iliad
by Homer
Needs the Iliad an introduction? Everyone knows the elopement of the Greek beauty Helena by the Trojan prince Paris during a beauty contest, the revenge of Menelaus and friends, the crossing to Troy, the weary war years at Troy, the quarrel between Agamemnon and Achilles, the ruse and death of Patroklos , the resentment of Achilles, the duel between Achilles and Hector, the death of the supposedly unbeatable Achilles, the ruse of the seer Calchas with a meter-high wooden horse and the final victory of the Greeks in the Trojan War. Need more to be said…- Jorg Rousseeuw
The Jewish War &Out of My Life
by Flavius Josephus
During the Roman occupation of Jerusalem, the Jewish priest, soldier and scientist Flavius Jospehus (37-100 A.D.) is sent to Rome to negotiate the release of a number of Jewish priests. After his return to Jerusalem, he joins the fight against the Romans. The Jewish War is his eyewitness account of this Jewish revolt. Flavius describes in great detail the destruction of Jerusalem and the revolt so dramatic for his people. In his gray afterlife, Flavius Jospehus wrote the autobiography Uit mijn leven. With this he tried to protect himself from the accusations against him of being a traitor and opportunist.- Jorg Rousseeuw