Giuseppe Pezzini, "Fighting the long defeat: Tolkien and Ancient Narratives of Decline"

Talk Description: Narrative of declines are widespread in ancient culture, in both philosophical and literary discourses. They normally posit a gradual degradation (moral and ontological) from an idealised Golden Age, which goes hand-in-hand with a detachment of gods from mortal affairs. Narratives of decline are also at the core of Tolkien’s mythology, and this is just another, neglected aspect of classical influence on Tolkien. The talk will discuss the reception of narratives of decline in Tolkien’s legendarium, pointing out similarities, but also contrasts and differences, with the aim to discuss some key patterns of (classical) reception in Tolkien’s theory and practice.

Short Biography: Prof. Giuseppe Pezzini is Tutor and Fellow in Latin at Corpus Christi College, Oxford which he joined in 2021, after five years of teaching in St Andrews (2016–2021), and research fellowships at Magdalen College Oxford (2013–2015) and the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton (2016). He worked as an assistant editor for the Oxford Dictionary of Medieval Latin (completed in 2013), and has published especially on Latin language and literature, philosophy of language, and the theory of fiction, ancient and modern. He was awarded a British Academy Fellowship in 2019 and the Philip Leverhulme Prize in 2021.

This talk will not be available on zoom and will not be recorded.