Introduction (How to use this blog)

I teach Classical Studies and Ancient History - but mainly I teach young people!
Over twenty five years of teaching I've built up a big collection of resources, teaching ideas and the kind of synthesis of knowledge that means I can lecture off the top of my head on Classical text. Sometimes for hours. Ask my students!
This blog then is an attempt to collect together a lot of those resources - mostly readers and beginner's guides I've written for students and other teachers over the years.
At least in Australia, where I teach, our text list changes regularly. Students need to get their heads round complex texts and they need to be able to compare these in terms of ideas, techniques and socio-historic context. Its a challenging task because it asks for a deep understanding not just of the text - but of the world that produced it. Its Classical Studies in a genuine way - our students act like real classicists - albeit ones reading the text in translation.
As a teacher it means I've had to consider these texts from a range of angles - and consider a variety of options for comparison - it leads, I think, to a much deeper appreciation of how the Classical world is deeply connected.
I love teaching students about that great Sophoclean tragedy - Oedipus the King - forget all that free will nonsense that later commentators have imposed on the text. What a narrow, anachronous reading. Oedipus, returning to the stage after the dreadful death of his mother wife and after the terrible act of blinding he has performed on himself. There he stands, dominating the stage, blood dripping from his empty eye sockets; in gouts down his cheeks. His first words, depending on translation of course, are "I am Oedipus!". In those three words he completely reclaims his kingship; his power and dignity and most importantly his humanity. He is the fully self-actualised man. Oedipus teachers us what it is to be human. To suffer. To be humiliated. To face up to your own unspeakable crimes. To seek the truth and accept the consequences of that truth. And to take action rather than being a passive recipient of the Fate the gods have laid out for us.
I can't think of any lessons we can teach young people that are more important than those.
Over the coming weeks and months I'll start putting up the various bits and pieces of a quarter of a century of reading, thinking and talking with young people about these ideas. I hope a few other people might find them useful.