Shadi Bartsch (born March 17, 1966) is an American historian and professor of

classics Classics, also classical studies or Ancient Greek and Roman studies, is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, ''classics'' traditionally refers to the study of Ancient Greek literature, Ancient Greek and Roman literature and ...

at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

.University of Chicago faculty directory of Classics: Shadi Bartsch
Accessed 2009-01-03. She has previously held professorships at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

and

Brown University Brown University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. It is the List of colonial colleges, seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the US, founded in 1764 as the ' ...

where she was the MacMillan professor of classics from 2008 to 2009. From 2015 to 2024 she was the Director of the Institute on the Formation of Knowledge (IFK) at the

Life

Bartsch, the daughter of a UN economist and a distant descendant of Persia's Qajar dynasty, spent her childhood in London, Geneva (where she studied at the

International School of Geneva The International School of Geneva (in French: ''École internationale de Genève''), commonly known as Ecolint, is a private, non-profit international school based in Geneva, Switzerland. Background Founded in 1924 in the service of the Leagu ...

Tehran Tehran (; , ''Tehrân'') is the capital and largest city of Iran. It is the capital of Tehran province, and the administrative center for Tehran County and its Central District (Tehran County), Central District. With a population of around 9. ...

Jakarta Jakarta (; , Betawi language, Betawi: ''Jakartè''), officially the Special Capital Region of Jakarta (; ''DKI Jakarta'') and formerly known as Batavia, Dutch East Indies, Batavia until 1949, is the capital and largest city of Indonesia and ...

, and the

Fiji Islands Fiji, officially the Republic of Fiji, is an island country in Melanesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It lies about north-northeast of New Zealand. Fiji consists of an archipelago of more than 330 islands—of which about ...

. She earned a B.A. ''summa cum laude'' from

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

in 1987 and a Ph.D. (1992) from the

in Classics. She was married to University of Chicago president and mathematician

Robert Zimmer Robert Jeffrey Zimmer (November 5, 1947 – May 23, 2023) was an American mathematician and academic administrator. From 2006 until 2021, he served as the 13th president of the University of Chicago and as the Chair of the Board for Argonne Na ...

from 2011 until his death in 2023.

Career

Bartsch's contributions have been to classical scholarship in the areas of the literature and culture of

Julio-Claudian The Julio-Claudian dynasty comprised the first five Roman emperors: Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero. This line of emperors ruled the Roman Empire, from its formation (under Augustus, in 27 BC) until the last of the line, Emper ...

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

, the ancient novel, Roman

stoicism Stoicism is a school of Hellenistic philosophy that flourished in ancient Greece and Rome. The Stoics believed that the universe operated according to reason, ''i.e.'' by a God which is immersed in nature itself. Of all the schools of ancient ...

, and the classical tradition. More recently, Bartsch has branched out into the effect of the ancient world on our modern one, especially in ''Plato Goes to China: The Ancient Greeks and Chinese Nationalism.'' Bartsch is also the author of an acclaimed translation of Vergil's "

Aeneid The ''Aeneid'' ( ; or ) is a Latin Epic poetry, epic poem that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Troy, Trojan who fled the Trojan War#Sack of Troy, fall of Troy and travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Ancient Rome ...

." She was awarded the Quantrell Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in the College in 2000 and the Faculty Award for Excellence in Graduate Teaching in 2006 at the University of Chicago. She won an

ACLS Fellowship The American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) is a private, nonprofit federation of 75 scholarly organizations in the humanities and related social sciences founded in 1919. It is best known for its fellowship competitions which provide a ra ...

in 1999 and a

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are Grant (money), grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, endowed by the late Simon Guggenheim, Simon and Olga Hirsh Guggenheim. These awards are bestowed upon indiv ...

in 2007. She served as chair of the Faculty Board of the

University of Chicago Press The University of Chicago Press is the university press of the University of Chicago, a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois. It is the largest and one of the oldest university presses in the United States. It pu ...

from 2006 to 2008 and editor-in-chief of both ''

Classical Philology Classics, also classical studies or Ancient Greek and Roman studies, is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, ''classics'' traditionally refers to the study of Ancient Greek and Roman literature and their original languages, ...

'' and KNOW. She was appointed the inaugural director of the Institute on the Formation of Knowledge. In July 2024 Bartsch was elected as a Fellow of the British Academy. She is the founding member of the interdisciplinary group FIR.

Books or Edited Volumes

* ''Decoding the Ancient Novel: The Reader and the Role of Description in Heliodorus and Achilles Tatius'' (1989) * ''Actors in the Audience: Theatricality and Doublespeak from Nero to Hadrian'' (1994) * ''Ideology in Cold Blood: A Reading of Lucan’s Civil War.'' (1998) * ''Oxford Encyclopedia of Rhetoric.'' (as editor with Thomas Sloane, Heinrich Plett, and Thomas Farrell, 2001) * ''Erotikon: Essays on Eros, Ancient and Modern'', (as editor with Thomas Bartscherer, 2005) * ''The Mirror of the Self: Sexuality, Self-Knowledge, and the Gaze in the Early Roman Empire'' (2006) * ''Ekphrasis'' (a special issue of ''Classical Philology'', as editor with Jas Elsner, 2007) * ''Seneca and the Self'', (as editor with David Wray, 2009) * ''Persius: A Study in Food, Philosophy, and the Figural'' (2015; winner of the Charles J. Goodwin award) * ''The Cambridge Companion to Seneca'', as editor with Alessandro Schiesaro, 2015) * ''The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Nero'', (as editor with Kirk Freudenburg and Cedric Littlewood, 2017) * ''The Chicago Seneca in Translation Series'', (as series editor with

Martha Nussbaum Martha Nussbaum (; Craven; born May 6, 1947) is an American philosopher and the current Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics at the University of Chicago, where she is jointly appointed in the law school and the philos ...

and Elizabeth Asmis, 2008–2017) * ''Virgil's Aeneid: A New Translation'' (2021) * ''Plato Goes to China: The Greek Classics and Chinese Nationalism'' (2023)

References

External links

* https://web.archive.org/web/20080628210853/http://humanities.uchicago.edu/depts/classics/people/bartschindex.html * http://today.brown.edu/faculty/2008/bartsch
"CONNECTIONS; Eros and its Dizzying Masks"
from ''The New York Times,'' March 10, 2001 * https://shadibartsch.com * https://ifk.uchicago.edu/ * https://humanities.uchicago.edu/articles/2024/07/prof-shadi-bartsch-zimmer-elected-british-academy {{DEFAULTSORT:Bartsch, Shadi 1966 births Living people Princeton University alumni University of California, Berkeley alumni Classical scholars of Brown University Classical scholars of the University of California, Berkeley Classical scholars of the University of Chicago American classical scholars American women classical scholars International School of Geneva alumni Scholars of Latin literature