Replaying Homer — Theatre/Archaeology. Notes on Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey. The Odyssey, adapted from Homer and directed by Christopher Nolan. Even before its release on July 17, the movie generated much discussion and commentary. Historical accuracy – helmets from the wrong period, Viking ships in the Bronze Age, and an Agamemnon that looks like Batman. Fidelity to Homer’s…
theatre-archaeology
Welsh memories in a Cretan landscape
I am on a short visit to Crete. Elounda, Lasithi. Out east. Past the prehistoric ruins of Malia, to where Chris (Witmore) and I drove in the Renault convertible on an impromptu photo shoot. It’s been twenty five years since. Another visit now to liquid commingling times. A dappled landscape I look out over a…
Some archaeological notes on futures studies
The Janus Maneuver Hindsight, foresight, and futures studies Everyone, it seems, is a futurist now. Here are some loosely gathered thoughts on why an archaeology of design may be a missing foundation. These are notes – so expect inaccuracies and mistakes of memory (hopefully minor). After Janus – the divine principle of looking both back…
Newsletter — Stanford Archaeology Center
Prospective reflections on 2025-26 Acting with nature — prehistory My new book Archaeologies of Nature: Activating the Archive, written with Gabriella Giannachi, University of Exeter and Turin, is now complete and in production. Open Access — it will be available as PDF in June 2026. We use an archaeology of artworks to probe human relationships…
Don Lavigne — archaeological epigram
Epigram — a concept Don Lavigne was on campus last Friday (Nov 21) to give what was a fascinating talk about ancient Greek epigram — short texts inscribed on something, typically a stone, base, offering, tomb, votive dedication, statue. Don didn’t offer a philological account of epigrams simply as texts. Instead he explored a media…
Digital Humanities — a zombie concept
This is part of my long-running commentary on the current state and future of the humanities, including what gets called digital humanities. Nudged by a symposium at Stanford There was a symposium at Stanford last week (November 14-15) called “The Futures of Antiquity in an Age of Digital Data and AI”. Credit goes to faculty…