The big event this year certainly was the Max-Planck Award in the Humanities (see video clip); cf. article in UT College of Liberal Arts newsletter. Under the terms of the award my base of operation for several months of the year until 2012 will be the Ruhr-University in Bochum, Germany, which submitted the successful application for the 2009 competition; I'll be teaching at UT every spring. I have just returned from my initial stay at RUB that was taken up mostly by administrative and organizational matters relating to our project Memoria Romana. As you will see from its home page, progress has been very gratifying. I am using the major part of the award for the support of younger scholars, including doctoral students, and we had more applications than we anticipated at our first deadline, Nov. 1, 2009. Another major task has been the preparation of several scholarly conferences on the subject of memory in ancient Rome. Like Rome, the whole enterprise was not built in a day nor by one person (Romulus, as we know these days, was just a memory figure) and I am profoundly grateful for the help and cooperation I have received.
All in all, this has been a great development. It did come on top of other commitments I had already made—who expects an award like that?—such as book #10, Augustus (in the Key Figures of Classical Antiquity series of the Cambridge Univ. Press), and programs with the Society of Biblical Literature on the cult of the Roman emperor in the context of early Christianity; the papers presented at these panels, which went over extremely well, now are being prepared for publication. Plus there is the upcoming Brown Symposium at Southwestern University on empires Roman and American. So things have been suitably hectic, including return trips to the U.S. every month and other travel in Europe, but, as my idol Placido Domingo (he definitely has more hair and a better voice) says, when I rest I rust.
I do look forward to teaching again in the spring (a course on Greece and Rome in film and a Greek course on the Odyssey) and I had a great time this past summer directing another Rome program for 15 students in our University Honors Program, Plan II. Under the auspices of the American Institute for Roman Culture, it was was another great success due to the energy and enthusiasm of all involved.
Last but not least, there are my wonderful grandkids, Alex, Zoe, and Nick, who make it all worthwhile. I have a lot to be thankful for, including wonderful family on both sides of the Atlantic. They, too, deserve an award.
