Alan Beale – författare

An exciting series that provides students with direct access to the ancient world by offering new translations of extracts from its key texts. Where did the idea of celebrating the Olympic Games every four years come from? The short answer is ancient Greece. The very name 'Olympic' announces an origin for the competition, but, as with most of our classical heritage, it is easy for the superficial similarities to conceal major cultural differences. The purpose of this new book in the Greece and Rome: Texts and Contexts series is to provide an introduction to Greek athletics and their most important competition at Olympia through a selection of contemporary visual and literary sources.

Actors of Dionysus (aod), formed in 1993 to tour Classical drama in translation and have established themselves as the leading exponents of Greek tragedy in contemporary theatre and education. With many national and international touring productions, two DVDs, a Penguin audio book of "Medea" and a whole series of pre-performance talks issued in their journal "Dionysus", they have brought Greek tragedy to new audiences worldwide. Scholars have been generous in their support for aod, and this selection of talks on five of Euripides'' plays, "Bacchae", "Medea", "Hippolytus", "Electra" and "Trojan Women", represents but a fraction of their contribution to aod''s success. Less formal than lectures, essays or articles, these talks offer sixth-form students and the general public a more accessible approach to the thoughts of some of our leading academics about this extraordinary playwright who can still capture the imagination of a twenty-first century audience. Contributors of this title include: Chris Carey, Kenneth Dover, Alex Garvie, Jasper Griffin, Richard Janko, Richard Jenkyns, Jenny March, Richard Rutherford, Richard Seaford, and Alan Sommerstein.