Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town

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Since then, Beard has become a standard-bearer for middle-aged women, and beloved by the young – indeed, by anyone who wants to be seen in terms of their ideas, not their looks; anyone who think it’s cool to be smart; and by those who relentlessly ask questions and never reject a contrary opinion out of hand. Beard’s intellectual style, which suffuses all her scholarship – a commitment to rigorous scepticism that refuses to be cynical – has made her a model for those who worry that the shouting and bullying of the digital world make reasoned political debate impossible. Discover the fascinating history of the humble notebook, from the bustling markets of medieval Florence to the quiet studies of our greatest thinkers. This is the perfect read for stationery fans and history buffs alike! Defiant British Museum appoints Mary Beard as trustee". The Guardian. 28 March 2020 . Retrieved 5 December 2022.

Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town - Mary Beard - Google Books Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town - Mary Beard - Google Books

In April 2013 she was named as Royal Academy of Arts Professor of Ancient Literature. [71] Beard was awarded an honorary degree from Oxford University in June 2018. [72] She also received an honorary degree from Yale University in May 2019. [73] Beard, Mary (24 August 2000). "Diary". London Review of Books. pp.34–35. ISSN 0260-9592 . Retrieved 25 April 2019. Mary Beard: UC3M". UC3M. 4 September 2017 . Retrieved 14 October 2017. Mary Beard [...] will be invested as Honorary Doctor of Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M) for her important academic and professional merits... Discover the true scope of Frank Herbert’s vision in Dune: Messiah, the epic second act in the classic sci-fi saga, presented in a cinematic illustrated edition from The Folio Society. As Mary Beard shows in The Fires of Vesuvius, her marvelous excavation of Pompeii’s history, the city is rarely what it is billed to be. A leading historian of Roman culture, a prolific essayist and an irrepressible blogger, Beard punctures conventional pieties about history and culture with formidable scholarly authority, always paying keen attention to the layering effects of the passage of time… With The Fires of Vesuvius, Beard has produced a lusciously detailed, erudite account of life in ancient Pompeii… The challenge of The Fires of Vesuvius rests in the way that its portrait of Pompeii overturns longstanding conceptions about the empire to which the city belonged. Most important is Beard’s depiction of the chaotic diversity of Pompeian life—the sheer variety of its religious experience, its linguistic multiplicity, its class tensions—which raises far-reaching questions about the nature of cultural and political identity in the imperial Roman context… With its focus on labor, education and religion, The Fires of Vesuvius is a testament to how much Roman studies has to offer the contemporary political imagination. Well-informed in the latest research in demography, the history of Roman politics, architecture, ancient economics, feminist and post-colonial studies, Beard probes the experience of men and women, free and slave, rich and poor… The point that permeates Beard’s work, along with much of the best of classical cultural and literary studies, is that part of the job of studying the past is to examine the assumptions of each storyteller and the effect each of their stories has, ripple-like, on the rest. Beard’s depiction of Pompeii manages to do justice to all its alien strangeness while prompting us to reflect on the significance of felt resemblances between its experience and our own—in the formation of cultural identity, habits of consumption, political nepotism, religion, sexuality, violent entertainments and much more. ” —Joy Connolly, The Nation

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Beard is the classics editor of The Times Literary Supplement, where she also writes a regular blog, "A Don's Life". [3] [4] Her frequent media appearances and sometimes controversial public statements have led to her being described as "Britain's best-known classicist". [5] The New Yorker characterises her as "learned but accessible". [6] Early life and education [ edit ] Oh Do Shut Up Dear! Mary Beard on the Public Voice of Women". Radio Times. Archived from the original on 1 August 2021 . Retrieved 1 August 2021. a b c d e f g Laity, Paul (10 November 2007). "The dangerous don". The Guardian. London, UK . Retrieved 16 July 2008. Between 1979 and 1983, Beard lectured in classics at King's College, London; she returned to Cambridge in 1984 as a Fellow of Newnham College and the only female lecturer in the classics faculty. [5] [8] Rome in the Late Republic, which she co-wrote with Cambridge historian Michael Crawford, was published the following year. [18]

Mary Beard | The Guardian Passing the dormouse test | Mary Beard | The Guardian

Bomb threat tweet sent to classicist Mary Beard". BBC News. 4 August 2013 . Retrieved 29 January 2017. Beard’s main inquiry is to find out how the Pompeiians actually lived. For example: how they organised themselves socially, whether they lived in areas according to wealth and/or profession. In this she proves that they lived in a very mixed manner. There were no ‘quartiers’. She also looks at how the homes and shops were laid out and decorated. Even if the rooms feel rather enclosing and with small windows, Pompeiians favoured mural paintings displaying opening vistas. A fair amount of the frescoes has survived but these are now in the Archaeological Museum in Naples. This museum, like the mountain, is a strongly recommended complementary visit. In the museum shop I found a wonderful and very fat book with the paintings; it is now sitting at home waiting for my eyes and time La pittura pompeiana. In her account Beard presented the four styles of painting that span a period of close to three centuries. She also looks at finances and where the money came from and how it related to the very international commerce that was engaged in this Mediterranean port (exotic and expensive dyes from the East, the food staple ‘garum’ from Hispania and a striking 'Indian' statuette). Their politics had to be somewhat provincial since the major decisions that affected the Republic/Empire were made in Rome. Of course only men could vote but curiously several men made references to outstanding women when seeking the voters.TheBookOfPhobiaaAndManias traces the rich and thought-provoking history in which our fixations have taken shape. The state religion in the Late Roman Republic: a study based on the works of Cicero". idiscover.lib.cam.ac.uk . Retrieved 2 November 2018.