Via Memoriae Classicae I: Asterix and Cleopatra

We’re getting to that time of year when people start to think about endings. The end of term; the end of the year; even, if we follow the interpretation of Mayan chronology and belief systems offered by that always-enlightening source of academic discussion that is the Internet, the end of the very world itself. Maybe I’m being overly dismissive of the latter, though. It’s not like the world hasn’t been visited by prodigies and natural disasters in recent times.

But I’m not here to talk about the apocalypse (though mental note: there probably would be a fun blog post to be written on classical views of the end of the world). For another ending is also approaching. Having now passed my viva, as I languish in that peculiar limbo-period of corrections and waiting for final PhD approval, I’m confronted by the rapidly-approaching end my time as a classics student and a final, enforced transition into the scary world of Real Academia or The Back-up Plan.

So indulge me if I’m in reflective mood. Don’t worry though, I’ve got no intention of posting my Classics memoirs. No hilarious reminiscences of school Latin lessons (thanks, Mr Bird!) or of the Faculty circa 2002 (What would be the point? I witter on about that often enough in the common room anyway, and at the end of the day this is Cambridge – besides a few changes to beard lengths and architectural alterations, things haven’t changed much in ten years). No, instead I’m going to embark on the probably equally self-indulgent but possibly more interesting pursuit of revisiting some film, TV and perhaps books from my childhood that (vaguely) relate to Classics and seeing what I make of them with the benefit of fifteen years or so’s study under my belt. I don’t anticipate having anything particularly scholarly to say – this isn’t meant to be any kind of Reception-Lite – but I hope maybe it’ll be fun.

So where to start? If I do more of these I intend to take them to some pretty tangential places, but to begin with something obvious is probably best. And what could be more obvious as a childhood route into Classics than Asterix? There are, of course, many many Asterix books and films (though anything produced from 1990 onwards DID NOT HAPPEN and DOES NOT COUNT)

Someone must have mocked these up in Photoshop because they do not exist.

but as I’ve carved out my niche for myself these days looking at contacts between the classical world and the Near East, one in particular leaps out. I refer, of course, to Asterix and Cleopatra, a tale of the clash of Roman, Gaulish, Egyptian and Hellenistic cultural traditions which doubtless had a seminal impact on my young and impressionable mind. The book came out in 1965, only two years after Liz Taylor was Cleopatra on the big screen. The Asterix version got its own film adaptation in 1968.