Dr Elena Theodorakopoulos PhD (Bristol)

Dr Elena Theodorakopoulos

Classics, Ancient History and Archaeology
Senior Lecturer in Classics

Contact details

Address
Arts Building
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

My research interests are in two main areas: Roman poetry of the Republic and Principate, and the reception of classical culture and literature in contemporary film and literature.

Teaching

I teach courses on Roman poetry and prose, Athenian Drama, Latin language, Classics and contemporary/20th century literature, Classics and film.

Postgraduate supervision

I welcome research proposals on women’s writing and classical reception, and on any aspect of Roman republican or Augustan poetry.

Current supervision:
Elizabeth Cook’s Achilles as a model for feminist reception
Ali Smith, gender, and the reception of Ovid’s Metamorphoses
Research topics I have supervised in the past include:
Tacitus’ Agricola and the politics of fama
Romulus and Numa in Ovid’s Fasti
Speech and Silence in Ovid’s Heroides
Postmodernism and Classical Reception


Find out more - our PhD Classics and Ancient History  page has information about doctoral research at the University of Birmingham.

Research

 My current projects are:

  • the reception of classical literature and myth in contemporary writing by women, and the translation/adaptation of classical literature by women writers.
  • a book on Catullus with particular emphasis on the performative aspects of his work

Past research

I have written on forms of closure in Roman and Hellenistic poetry, on the representation of Rome in film, and on Catullus.

Publications

Recent publications

Book

Theodorakopoulos, E & Cox, F (eds) 2018, Homer’s daughters: women’s responses to Homer in the twentieth century and beyond. Classical Presences, Oxford University Press.

Theodorakopoulos, E & Cox, F (eds) 2016, Homer's Daughters: Women's Responses to Homer, 1914-2014. Classical Presences, Oxford University Press.

Theodorakopoulos, E & Cox, F (eds) 2012, Female Transgressions: Classical Reception and Contemporary Women Writers. Oxford University Press.

Theodorakopoulos, E 2010, Ancient Rome at the Cinema: Story and Spectacle in Hollywood and Rome. Bristol Phoenix Press.

Spencer, D & Theodorakopoulos, E (eds) 2006, Advice and its Rhetoric in Greece and Rome. Levante Editori, Bari.

Theodorakopoulos, E 2004, Attitudes to Theatre from Plato to Milton. vol. NCLS vol.7, Bari.

Article

Theodorakopoulos, E 2019, 'Classical myth and literature in the prose and poetry of Laura Riding: ‘The ever-dissolving image of deceptively tranquil antiquity’', Synthesis, vol. 12 (2019).

Chapter (peer-reviewed)

Theodorakopoulos, E 2019, Closure and the Book of Virgil. in C Martindale & F Mac Gorain (eds), The Cambridge Companion to Virgil. 2nd edn, Cambridge Companions to Literature, Cambridge University Press, pp. 226-240. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316756102.016

Spencer, D & Theodorakopoulos, E 2006, Good men who have skill in speaking: Performing advice in Rome. in D Spencer & E Theodorakopoulos (eds), Advice and its Rhetoric in Greece and Rome. Levante Editori, Bari, pp. 1-29.

Chapter

Theodorakopoulos, E 2013, Catullus and Lesbia translated in women's historical novels. in L Hardwick & S Harrison (eds), Classics in the Modern World: A Democratic Turn?., Chapter 20, Oxford University Press.

Theodorakopoulos, E & Cox, F 2012, Interview with Sarah Ruden. in E Theodorakopoulos & F Cox (eds), Female Transgressions: Classical Reception and Contemporary Women Writers. Oxford University Press.

Theodorakopoulos, E 2012, Variations on a Theme: Voices in Classical Reception. in E Theodorakopoulos & F Cox (eds), Female Transgressions: Classical Reception and OCntemporary Women Writers.

Theodorakopoulos, E 2007, The sites and sights of Rome in Fellini's films: 'not a human habitation but a psychical entity'. in D Larmour & D Spencer (eds), The sites of Rome: time, space, memory. Oxford University Press, Oxford.

Theodorakopoulos, E & Skinner, M 2006, c.68: Love and death, and the gifts of Venus and the Muses. in A Companion to Catullus.

Book/Film/Article review

Theodorakopoulos, E 2009, 'A Companion to Ancient Epic', The Classical Review, vol. 59, no. 1, pp. 8-10. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0009840X08001571

View all publications in research portal