Maria Wyke

Maria Wyke

Professor of Latin

Head of Department

Term time office hours: Tuesdays 12:00-1:00, Wednesdays 12:00-1:00

email: m.wyke@ucl.ac.uk

Research interests: Latin literature, especially Roman love poetry; ancient gender and sexuality; reception studies, especially Julius Caesar, Rome on film, classics and popular culture.

IRIS research profile

Profile I was born in London to a Mexican mother and an Australian father. Educated at Catholic schools, I studied Classics at Oxford (where I began ancient Greek) and then at Cambridge (via Manchester – but that’s a long story). My interest in gender, sexuality, and desire in Roman love poetry was encouraged by the supervision of John Henderson, and from contact with enthusiastic and welcoming academics in the United States. After a year out to study film and television at the British Film Institute (1992-93), I went to the University of Reading, where I was fortunate to pursue my dual interest in Rome on film and Latin love poetry, both in teaching and research. I arrived at UCL in September 2005 as Chair of Latin where, with my new colleagues, I am developing the department’s interests in both Latin and Reception Studies. My full CV is available here: cv.

Larger Publications:

  • Caesar in the USA: Popular Culture, Classical Reception, American Identity (University of Chicago press, forthcoming)
  • co-editor with Luke Houghton of Perceptions of Horace: A Roman Poet and His Readers (2009)
  • Caesar: A Life in Western Culture (Granta, 2007)
  • editor of Julius Caesar in Western Culture (Blackwell, 2006)
  • co-editor of Roman Bodies: From Antiquity to the Eighteenth Century, with Andrew Hopkins (BSR, 2005)
  • The Roman Mistress: Ancient and Modern Representations (OUP, 2002)
  • co-editor of The Uses and Abuses of Antiquity, with Professor Michael Biddiss (Peter Lang, 1999)
  • editor of Parchments of Gender: Deciphering the Bodies of Antiquity (OUP, 1998)
  • editor of Gender and the Body in the Ancient Mediterranean (Blackwell, 1998)
  • Projecting the Past: Ancient Rome, Cinema and History (Routledge, 1997)
  • co-editor of An Illusion of the Night: Women in Ancient Societies, with Leonie Archer and Susan Fischler (Macmillan Press, 1994)

Projects in Progress:

  • series editor of Classical Receptions (Blackwell)
  • co-edited collection with Pantelis Mickelakis on The Ancient World in Silent Cinema

Projects Planned:

long-term collaborative study of the ancient world in silent cinema, with Pantelis Mickelakis of the University of Bristol

stage 1 completed: screenings at the Bloomsbury Theatre, London in 2009 (funded by UCL Futures)

stage 2 current: visits to European and American film archives; consulation with archivists, curators, academics and exhibitors (funded by the British Academy); preparation fo a special issue or edited collection on the ancient world in silent cinema

Page last modified on 21 feb 12 16:00