Classics 24, Section 1
Apuleius and Augustine (1 unit, P/NP)
Professor Dylan Sailor
Friday 3:00-4:00, 262 Dwinelle Hall, CCN: 14727

Apuleius' Golden Ass is a Roman novel of the second century AD that tells of a man's magical transformation into an ass, his experiences as he travels around in that new form, and his eventual rescue. Augustine's Confessions are an account offered by a fifth-century AD bishop of his lascivious and ambitious youth and his eventual conversion to Christianity. By reading alongside each other these two, superficially rather different, books, we will explore a central preoccupation that they share: the relationship between life and text, between living and reading and writing. We'll look at the idea of the world as a text to be interpreted, at storytelling as a way of affecting the world, at the tension between reading for pleasure and reading for edification, at the dangers and ironies of using stories as a guide for life, and at ancient ideas of fiction and truth. Ideally this seminar will attract students who don't absolutely hate reading, since we'll be reading and talking about two books. Apart from that, it should be accessible to most students, in one way or another.

Dylan Sailor studies the literature and history of ancient Rome. He has published articles, mainly on Roman historical writing, and is the author of a recent book on the Roman historian Tacitus. At the undergraduate level, he regularly teaches Classics 10B: Introduction to Roman Civilization, as well as intermediate and senior-level classes in Latin and ancient Greek. Originally from the state of Washington, he received his Ph.D. from the Classics Department here at Berkeley in 2002, and after teaching for three years at UC San Diego returned to Berkeley as a professor in 2005.