The ninth grade English classes are doing research papers on aspect of Greek and Roman life - what kinds of jobs people had, what they did for fun, what they ate, how they fought, what their music sounded like - all my favorite stuff. In graduate school (art history school, not library school!) I wrote my thesis about Greek jewelry, because I think that people's everyday personal objects tell us what we really want to know. Their literature and marble buildings tell us some very fine things about them, truly, but how a lady wore her hair or whether she liked long necklaces or short gives us a more evocative peek into her mindset, I think. Certainly what they ate makes us grateful to be in the 21st century - you were picturing a nice Greek salad and some baklava? Sorry. Not in 450 BC - try coarse bread and olives, some fish if you were wealthy.
So I got to host the ninth graders here in the library all week and point out where the best books are for their subjects, introduce them to the mysteries of double-sided copying, and offer to be of service for search terms and suggestions. I'm pleased to say they took me seriously, and I've been fielding requests ever since. In many cases I've copied articles from some of the larger books to preserve their bindings (but you have to do the bibliography work yourself - there's no free lunch!) So you out there, if you're looking for that article on how to fold your peplos or what silphium tasted like . . . see me at the desk!
Incidentally, for you sharp-eyed folk who looked at the picture: the Greeks didn't wear togas. They wore all kinds of other big folded and pinned pieces of cloth, but not togas. Go ahead, ask me about it. I'm here weekdays until 4:30.
No comments:
Post a Comment