Unit LATIN LITERATURE

Course

Humanities

Study-unit Code

35076206

Curriculum

Moderno

Teacher

Paola Paolucci

Teachers

Paola Paolucci

Hours

36 ore - Paola Paolucci

CFU

Course Regulation

Coorte 2018

Offered

2019/20

Learning activities

Base

Area

Lingue e letterature classiche

Academic discipline

L-FIL-LET/04

Type of study-unit

Obbligatorio (Required)

Type of learning activities

Attività formativa monodisciplinare

Language of instruction

Italian

Contents

The course is divided into an institutional part and a monographic part. The first part will be aimed at providing a theoretical frame of reference concerning the historical design of Latin literature from its origins to the Late Antiquity, with particular regard to the theory of literary genres and notions of method useful for the analysis of the Latin literary text. The second part will be devoted to the theme "Images of Didone in Latin literature". After a recovery of the origins of Didone's "stories" and their premises, we will analyze excerpts from books I, IV and VI of Virgil's Aeneid and the entire VII epistle of Ovid's Heroides; furthermore, some results of the Dido myth will be shown in the Latin imperial and late antique literature.

Reference texts

For the History of Latin literature: G. Garbarino, Letteratura latina (in three volumes or in a unique volume), ed. Paravia, various reprints; G. Picone - E. Romano - F. Gasti, Lezioni Romane (in 4 volumes), ed. Loescher, 2003; F. Stok - G. Abbamonte - S. Casali, Storia della letteratura latina, ed. La Scuola, 2005; G.B. Conte, Letteratura Latina, ed. Mondadori and Le Monnier, various reprints; M. Bettini, Cultura e letteratura a Roma, profilo storico e testi, Firenze, La Nuova Italia, 1999; G. Cipriani, Storia della letteratura latina, Foggia, Il Castello Edizioni, 2015, M. von Albrecht, Storia della letteratura latina, it. transl. by A. Setaioli, Einaudi 1995. For the monographic part: M.N. Iulietto, Imagines Didonis. Prolegomeni allo studio di un mito, University Book, Perugia 2015; selected texts in pdf, on line in unistudium.

Educational objectives

The teaching represents the main occasion in the three-year period to learn the entire historical design of Latin literature and to measure himself in the methodologies of analysis of the literary text in Latin. It is also a fundamental objective of teaching to provide students with the basics and tools to tackle a transversal discourse of literary theory; therefore the main purchasing knowledge must concern: 1. Knowledge of authors, works and epochs of Latin literature; 2. Knowledge of the main features of the main literary genres; 3. Knowledge of the foundations of the Latin literary institution with regard to the literary object, the subjects of literary communication (literary community, author, publishing and public), text positioning over time (text transmission) and space (circulation of the text), also with regard to literary pragmatics; 4. Knowledge of the main elements of Latin versification; 5. Knowledge of the foundations of Latin narratology. The main ability (that is the ability to apply the acquired knowledge) will be: Knowing how to read, translate, analyze and comment on a literary text in Latin, identifying the salient content elements and decoding the message.

Prerequisites

In order to understand and know how to re-use / elaborate independently the literary knowledge and concepts provided by the teaching, it is necessary to have a good linguistic-grammatical knowledge. The analysis of the texts, which will be examined during the course, also requires proven translation skills from Latin to Italian. The possession of the aforementioned knowledge and skills is an indispensable prerequisite for the student who wants to take the course profitably and who aspires to a concrete educational success.

Teaching methods

The prevailing didactic method involves lectures in the classroom assisted, if necessary, by multimedia tools; there are also practical exercises in metric reading, textual translation and analysis and digital humanities laboratories applied to Latin literature, held by collaborators and scholars of the subject. In-depth seminars are also planned.

Other information

Students can acquire an additional 3 credits (to be inserted among the 6 of further knowledge) by writing a written report on a topic related to the course agreed with the teacher. The credits will be recognized after a positive evaluation of the report by the teacher.

The report must be a maximum of 10 pages of 2000 characters approx .; must use the bibliography critically and the text must be accompanied by notes.

Learning verification modality

The evaluation will be achieved after passing an oral exam, with the aim of verifying the acquisition of knowledge related to the historical design of Latin literature from the origins to the Late Antiquity and the theory of literary genres within the Latin literary system. The oral exam will also have the purpose of verifying the ability to read in metrics, translate, analyze and comment on a Latin literary text, chosen from among those object of the monographic course, verifying at the same time the real possession of linguistic knowledge of an adequate level. The timing of these oral evaluations is governed by the calendar, approved by the Department Council. The duration of each individual oral exam is quite considerable, since each evaluation includes the following phases: 1. Verification phase of literary knowledge through three open questions on the history of literature and the theory of literary genres; 2. Verification phase of the textual analysis competences through the metric reading, oral translation, analysis and comment of a text chosen in the context of the in-depth monographic topic during the course.

Extended program