A Greek Epic is this year’s biggest hit in the cinemas, and the world’s most powerful man keeps posting memes of himself as a Roman emperor. What can we learn from the Ancient World today, and what can ancient Rome and Greece teach us about our own time?
Mary Beard is among the world’s foremost experts on Ancient Rome. She is a highly respected academic, the author of landmark books such as The Emperor of Rome and SPQR, and a familiar face from a number of BBC documentaries on subjects such as Pompeii and the Roman Empire.
When she visits Norway for the first time, it is with her latest book Talking Classics, where she tells the story of a meeting, as a little girl in a museum, with bread several thousand years old, and how this sparked an interest in history. She also shares insights from a life in academia, and examines how the past is used and misused by megalomaniac heads of state. She is joined by her Norwegian colleague, classical philologist and translator, Thea Selliaas Thorsen.
The conversation will be in English.
