Johanna Hanink talks with fellow Hellenists about their latest work

Lesche: Ancient Greece, New Ideas

45 episodes indexed · 41 hours

Periods · The Bronze Age, Archaic Greece, The Persian Wars, Classical Greece, Philip and Alexander, The Hellenistic world, Greece under Rome

Themes · The polis Philosophy Religion Theatre Art and building War Daily life

In Greek antiquity a lesche was a place to sit and talk, and Johanna Hanink, a professor at Brown University, uses the name for conversations with other Hellenists about their newest research; 44 of 51 episodes are here, 6 eras, 40 hours.

Where to start. The earliest indexed episode is '(Imperial) Greek Epic' (2024); 44 episodes of this show are in the section; the feed has no episode pages, so every card goes to the show.

I feel like…

ThinkingAny

ideas, belief and how a polis was ordered

FeelingAny

stories, performance, art and ordinary lives

DoingAny

war and expansion

PeriodAny

when it happens

Minoans and Mycenaeans c. 3000 - 1100 BC · 7

1h 01mTranslating the Odyssey, with Daniel Mendelsohn Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Daniel Mendelsohn

Daniel Mendelsohn, Editor-at-large at the New York Review of Books, discusses his new translation of Homer's Odyssey for the University of Chicago Press, following his earlier translation of the poetry of Constantine Cavafy.

58mTranslating the Iliad, with Emily Wilson Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Emily Wilson

Emily Wilson, Professor of Classical Studies at the University of Pennsylvania and a MacArthur Fellow, discusses translating two passages of the Iliad, Book 6 lines 482 to 502 and Book 22 lines 199 to 204.

54mHomer's Bronze Age Women Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Emily Hauser

54mA New "Green and Yellow" of Odyssey 11, with Richard Hunter and Rebecca Laemmle Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

51mMyths of Kingship in Greece and the Near East Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Christopher Metcalf

Christopher Metcalf, Associate Professor in Classical Literature at the University of Oxford, compares myths of kingship in early Greece and the ancient Near East, from Gilgamesh and Sargon to Iliad Book 1.

48m(Translating) the Scholia to the Iliad Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Bill Beck

Bill Beck, Assistant Professor of Classical Studies at Indiana University, publishes the first volume of a translation of the ancient scholia to Homer's Iliad, the vetera scholia to Iliad Book 1-2, first in a series.

48mThe Doloneia (Iliad Book 10) Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Christos C. Tsagalis

Christos Tsagalis, Professor of Ancient Greek Literature at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, discusses Iliad Book 10, traditionally split into the Nyktegersia night-watch scene and the spy-mission that follows it.

Dark Age and Archaic Greece 1100 - 480 BC · 1

48mMigration and the Early Greek World Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Naoise Mac Sweeney

Naoíse Mac Sweeney, Professor of Classical Archaeology at the University of Vienna, discusses her ERC-funded project Migration and the Making of the Ancient Greek World, whose first volume covers local migration from about 1200 to 550 BCE.

Classical Athens and Sparta 479 - 386 BC · 2

59mSubject Communities of the Athenian Empire Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Leah Lazar, Christy Constantakopoulou

Leah Lazar, postdoctoral researcher at Oxford's Centre for the Study of Ancient Documents, and Christy Constantakopoulou examine Athens and its fifth-century subject allies, the Athenian empire Constantakopoulou traced in The Dance of the Islands.

57mAthens, 403 BC: A Choral History Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Vincent Azoulay, Paulin Ismard

Vincent Azoulay of the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales and Paulin Ismard of Aix-Marseille University study the restoration of democracy in Athens in 403 BC, examining the Athenian civil war through the prism of chorality.

Philip and Alexander 359 - 323 BC · 2

52mThe Life of Demosthenes Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With James Romm

James Romm, the James H. Ottaway Jr. Professor of Classics at Bard College, discusses his biography Demosthenes: Democracy's Defender, part of Yale University Press's Ancient Lives series, drawing on speeches by Demosthenes and Aeschines.

50mAlexander in the East Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Rachel Kousser

The Hellenistic Age 323 - 31 BC · 2

55mThe Art of Hellenistic Queenship Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Patricia Kim

Patricia Kim, assistant professor at New York University, discusses her book on the art of Hellenistic queenship, tracing Pliny's account of Timochares' proposed floating statue of Arsinoe II.

54mThe Ancient Shore Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Paul Kosmin

Paul Kosmin, Philip J. King Professor of Ancient History at Harvard, discusses The Ancient Shore, winner of the American Historical Association's 2025 prize, drawing on Agatharchides of Cnidus, On the Erythraean Sea, from the second century BC.

Greek Life, Thought and the Wider World across the centuries · 31

1h 12mWhy Classicists Should Care about Byzantium, with Anthony Kaldellis Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Anthony Kaldellis

Anthony Kaldellis, professor of Classics at the University of Chicago, argues classicists should study Byzantium, and discusses an in-progress edited volume on the transmission of classical texts there, including Eustathius of Thessalonica's commentaries on the Iliad and the Odyssey.

1h 12mThe New Euripides Papyrus Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Yvona Trnka-Amrhein, John Gibert

Yvona Trnka-Amrhein and John Gibert, both of the University of Colorado Boulder, publish the editio princeps of a newly-discovered papyrus containing lines from Euripides' fragmentary plays Ino and Poluidos.

1h 07mSPECIAL: Classicism & Chronopolitics: Sasha-Mae Eccleston's EPIC EVENTS Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Sasha-Mae Eccleston

Sasha-Mae Eccleston, the John Rowe Workman Assistant Professor of Classics, discusses classicizing and chronopolitics in the United States, reading Homer's Iliad and Euripides' Medea alongside a much-quoted line of Virgil's Aeneid.

1h 02mIsis Worship in the Greek East Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Lindsey Mazurek

Lindsey Mazurek, assistant professor of Classical Studies at Indiana University, traces how Isis worship under the Roman Empire intersected with constructions of Greek identity, the subject of her book Isis in a Global Empire.

1h 02mThe Athenian Funeral Oration Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With David M. Pritchard

David Pritchard, Associate Professor of Greek History at the University of Queensland, edits The Athenian Funeral Oration: After Nicole Loraux, and researches the symbiosis between war, democracy and culture in classical Athens.

1h 01mHerodotus and the Presocratics Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Scarlett Kingsley

Scarlett Kingsley, Associate Professor of Classics at Agnes Scott College, sets Herodotus in the intellectual milieu of the fifth century, reading his account of Solon's meeting with Croesus in the Histories.

1hThe Longue Durée of the Greek Polis Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With John Ma

59mClassical Athenian Funerary Sculpture Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Seth Estrin

Seth Estrin, Assistant Professor of History of Art and Architecture at Harvard, discusses Grief Made Marble, his emotion-based reading of Classical Athenian funerary sculpture, drawing on Euripides' tragedy Alcestis.

58mSymbola (Monetiform Tokens) Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Clare Rowan, M.E. Gkikaki

Clare Rowan, Associate Professor at the University of Warwick and principal investigator on the ERC-funded project Token Communities of the Ancient Mediterranean, and M.E. Gkikaki discuss monetiform tokens in Greek antiquity, via Aristophanes' Ekklesiazousai.

57mMonsters in Classical Myth Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Debbie Felton, Carolina López-Ruiz

Debbie Felton, Professor of Classics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and Carolina López-Ruiz, Professor at the University of Chicago Divinity School, discuss monsters in classical myth, including López-Ruiz's chapter on the Sphinx.

57mPlato and Athens Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Carol Atack

Carol Atack, fellow and Director of Studies in Classics at Newnham College, Cambridge, discusses her biography Plato: A Civic Life, the second volume in Paul Cartledge's Great Lives of the Ancient World series.

56mThe Sophists Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Josh Billings, Christopher Moore

56mWedding Poetics in Early Greek Literature Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Andromache Karanika

Andromache Karanika, Professor of Classics at the University of California, Irvine, traces wedding poetics through the Iliad's Teikhoskopeia scene and Sappho 44, on the wedding of Hector and Andromache.

55mStasis: Political Violence in Classical Greece Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Scott Lawin Arcenas

Scott Lawin Arcenas, associate professor of history and classics at the University of Montana, examines political violence in Greek city-states between 500 and 301 BCE, the stasis his new book quantifies and qualifies.

55mReappraising the Choruses of Greek Tragedy Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Rosa Andújar

Rosa Andújar, Associate Professor of Classics at Barnard College, Columbia University, discusses her book Playing the Chorus in Greek Tragedy, examining the chorus in Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, from fragmentation to semi-choruses and actor-chorus interaction.

55m(Imperial) Greek Epic Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Emma Greensmith, Tim Whitmarsh

Emma Greensmith, Associate Professor of Classical Languages at Oxford, and Tim Whitmarsh, Regius Professor of Greek at Cambridge, trace Imperial Greek epic from Quintus of Smyrna's Posthomerica to Nonnus's Dionysiaca.

54mThe Small Cycladic Islands Project Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Alex Knodell

Alex Knodell, chair of the classics department at Carleton College, reflects on the six-season Small Cycladic Islands Project, co-directed with Demetrios Athanasoulis of the Ephorate of Antiquities of the Cyclades.

54mThe Cambridge Greek Lexicon Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With James Diggle

James Diggle, Professor Emeritus of Greek and Latin at Cambridge and Editor-in-Chief of the 2021 Cambridge Greek Lexicon, explains why the two-volume dictionary took 24 years to complete and how it improves on LSJ.

54mSPECIAL: Netflix's KAOS, with creator Charlie Covell Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Charlie Covell

52mDream Interpretation, from Homer to Aristotle Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Mirjam E. Kotwick

Mirjam Kotwick, Associate Professor of Classics at Princeton University, discusses her new book The Ancient Interpretation of Dreams, tracing early Greek hermeneutics from Homer's dream scenes to Aristotle's writings on divination in sleep.

52mTime and Ancient Textiles Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Marie-Louise Nosch

Marie-Louise Nosch, Professor of Ancient Greek History at the University of Copenhagen and former director of its Centre for Textile Research, discusses weaving scenes in Homer and Hesiod's account of Pandora's creation.

52mThe Life (and Times) of Diogenes 'the Cynic' Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Inger Kuin

Inger Kuin, Associate Professor of Classics at the University of Virginia, discusses her book on Diogenes the Cynic, drawing on Diogenes Laertius's Life of Diogenes and on Xenophon's Anabasis for Sinope, his birthplace.

52mEnchantment Technologies of Ancient Greek Religion Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Tatiana Bur

Tatiana Bur discusses her book Technologies of the Marvellous in Ancient Greek Religion, tracing self-moving devices from Hephaestus's tripods in Iliad 18 to the mechanical works of Hero of Alexandria.

51mSeal-Impressions (typoi) and Ancient Image Making Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Verity Platt

Verity Platt, professor of Classics and History of Art at Cornell University, discusses her new book Epistemic Impressions, tracing ancient image-making through Herodotus's account of the seal of Polycrates and Pliny's Natural History.

50mThe Influence of Plato's Timaeus: Beauty & Creation Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Piero Boitani

Piero Boitani, Professor Emeritus of Comparative Literature at the University of Rome, discusses his book Timaeus in Paradise, which names Dante's Paradiso and Raphael's School of Athens among the later sites of the Timaeus's reception and influence.

49m"Bilingual" Ionic Column Capitals Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Sam Holzman

Sam Holzman, assistant professor at Princeton's Seeger Center for Hellenic Studies, discusses bilingual Ionic column capitals in his book Retrospective Columns, tracing the style through Vitruvius's de Architectura and the architectural drawings in Stuart and Revett's Antiquities of Athens.

49mAthenian Drama in Sicily (Ferdia Lennon, GLORIOUS EXPLOITS) Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Ferdia Lennon

Ferdia Lennon, winner of the Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize 2024, discusses his novel Glorious Exploits, set in Syracuse after the Athenian invasion of Sicily during the Peloponnesian War.

47mA New Anacreontic Poem on Stone, with Andrej Petrovic Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Andrej Petrovic

Andrej Petrovic, Professor of Classics at the University of Virginia, discusses a new verse-inscription from Teos in Turkey, discovered in 2013; he has co-authored a monograph on it with Mustafa Adak and Christian Marek.

47mLuck (and Lucklessness) in Ancient Greek Thought Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Daniel Schillinger

Daniel Schillinger, a Lecturer in Political Science at Yale University, discusses his new book Luckless, tracing the idea of luck through Sophocles, Euripides, Thucydides and Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics.

47mSPECIAL: Pasolini's THE RETURN, with Homerist Barbara Graziosi Lesche: Ancient Greece, New IdeasPodcast

With Barbara Graziosi

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