Leventis Lecture Series - Fully Booked

The College of Humanities is delighted to invite you to join us at this free event in London exploring the impact of Greek culture. Supported by the A.G. Leventis Foundation, the evening is an opportunity to hear Exeter academics draw on new, cutting-edge research to illuminate the impact of Greek culture, both in the ancient world and beyond.

The Leventis Initiative, sponsored by the A.G. Leventis Foundation, facilitates research carried out by the University of Exeter into the impact of Greek culture in antiquity and upon the modern world.  Established in May 1979, the A.G. Leventis Foundation is the outcome of the vision of the Cypriot entrepreneur Anastasios G. Leventis (1902-1978), who laid the bases of its focus on society, education and culture.

Now in its fourth decade, the Foundation retains its adherence to these priorities, keenly supporting the dissemination of Greek and Cypriot cultural heritage, as well as extensive public benefits programs, pioneering environmental protection projects, and medical research. Projects include studentships, a lectureship and the ‘Leventis Room’ within the Classics department at the University of Exeter.

Thucydides: A Text for Our Times? Professor Neville Morley

The claim of the ancient Greek historian Thucydides that his work would be "a possession for all time", and would help his readers make sense of their own situation through the past events he described, continues to be vindicated. Indeed, Thucydides is now more widely discussed and cited than ever before, in many different contexts: global politics and strategy, the crisis of the European Union, the Brexit referendum and the election of President Trump. This lecture will look at three important passages from his work, and the ways in which they have been understood in relation to current events: his ideas on the causes of war, the civil war at Corcyra, and the Melian Dialogue. Many modern readings are simplistic, treating Thucydides as if he was a contemporary political scientist and ignoring the complexities of his work; but if we read him carefully, he can indeed help us make sense of the situation in which we find ourselves.

Extra-terrestrial perspectives from Moon-view to Pale Blue Dot: ancient imagination meets modern science. Professor Karen Ni Mheallaigh

In this presentation Professor Karen Ni Mheallaigh will explore ancient speculation about what the Earth looked like when viewed from outer space. This powerful ancient tradition, which crosses the boundaries between ancient philosophy and comic fantasy, lurks beneath the most stunning photographic images of our planet to emerge from the modern space age when the ancient imagination became reality for the first time in human history.

This lecture examines Greek fantasies of how the Earth would look from outer space in texts such as Plato’s Phaedrus (5th century BC) and Lucian’s Icaromenippus and True Stories (2nd century AD). Of particular interest are the philosophical theories in which such extra-terrestrial perspectives are embedded, and the ideas towards which these such imaginary remote views of our Earth prompt the reader. When mapped against modern photographic images, including Earthrise (1968), Blue Marble (1972) and Pale Blue Dot (1990), we find fascinating – and challenging – dialogues between the ancient thought-world and our own.

Waiting List

This event is currently fully booked but further places may become available. Please join the waiting list by completing the online booking form.

Alumni, staff, students and members of the public are all invited to attend this event.