Department of Classics - Princeton University

I study Greek literature, and at present my research focuses on Greek prose of the Roman Imperial era. I am interested in the history of rhetoric and oratory, the figure of the author, issues of professional self-presentation, and also ancient medical writers, including Galen. I received my PhD from the University of Chicago and came to Princeton in 2008.

Currently, I am writing a book on Aelius Aristides’ Hieroi Logoi (Sacred Tales), a unique first person account of dreams, illness, and divine healing that reveals the place of the eccentric and the sacred in the social construction of late ancient subjectivity. I am also beginning a new project on the intersections of mythic, cultural, and intellectual geography in the physical landscape of imperial-era Asia Minor, starting from Philostratus’ third-century dialogue On Heroes. 

I have taught courses in Greekat all levels, from Homeric epic to Roman imperial prose. Recently, I have offered undergraduate courses on the Greek novel (“Fiction and Fantasy”), Greek oratory (“The Rhetoric of Praise”), and post-classical Greek (“Miracles and Miracle Workers"), as well as Sophocles and Plato, and a graduate course on “Heroic Lives and Legends of the Second Sophistic.” I also contribute to the department’s introductory language sequence and the lecture course on classical mythology.