XClose

Department of Greek & Latin

Home
Menu

Fiachra Mac Góráin

Associate Professor of Classics

Fiachra headshot

Email: f.macgorain@ucl.ac.uk

Office hours: usually Mondays 11.15-13.00, and by appointment. UCL students please book a slot here.

Research interests: Latin literature, especially Augustan poetry; Roman authors' use of the past, including the literary past; Virgil and his reception; Dionysus; Ireland and the Classics.

Research supervision: I am interested in supervising research students in Roman literature and culture and their reception. I value theoretically informed and interdisciplinary approaches, and have co-supervised with colleagues in other departments at UCL. I would be interested in co-supervising with colleagues at KCL, RHUL, the Warburg Institute, and the ICS.

I am currently co-supervising PhD theses on Dionysus in Rome; the reception of Virgil's Arcadia; and narrative in Euripides' Trojan trilogy. I have recently co-supervised PhD theses on the imperial cult in Augustan poetry; Philodemus and Virgil; the modern reception of Greek tragedy; narrative in Petronius; animals in Valerius Flaccus; and prophecy in the epic tradition.

Academia.edu research profile

UCL research profile

I completed a BA in Classics at Trinity College Dublin, and masters and doctoral degrees at the University of Oxford.

My research interests range widely over Latin literature and the history of interpretation. I find it fascinating to explore how we use and understand antiquity, sometimes with modern lenses, and sometimes with ancient ones.

I am particularly interested in Dionysus in the ancient world, and in the later reception of the god, and was the historical consultant for a BBC documentary with Bettany Hughes entitled Bacchus Uncovered, which also featured Phiroze Vasunia.

At present I am finishing a book to be entitled Virgil's Dionysus, and several articles on Virgil.

I organized a conference on Dionysus in Rome and Italy. The proceedings of this conference, entitled Dionysus and Rome, have been been published as Dionysus and Rome. Religion and Literature (Berlin and New York: De Gruyter, 2020).

Together with Valentina Arena (UCL History) I organized a colloquium on Varro and antiquarianism in the late Roman Republic. The proceedings were published as Varronian Moments in 2017.

I often give school talks on Roman topics and on Latin set texts, especially those by Virgil, Horace, and Ovid. I am also the Department's Undergraduate Outreach Officer and Study Abroad Tutor (from September 2022).

Publications: