Chris Trinacty

  • Professor of Classics

Education

  • PhD, Brown University, 2007
  • MA, University of Arizona, 2000
  • BA, Pitzer College, 1996)

Biography

My primary research interests revolve around the works of Seneca, an important philosopher, tragedian, and politician of the 1st C. CE. Since writing a book about his tragedies, I have been investigating his Naturales Quaestiones, a treatise about natural science that explains the workings of the natural world from a Stoic point of view. I have produced two commentaries to this work: one focuses on his book on terrestrial waters (rivers, seas, lakes, etc.) and the other gives a broad overview of the work as a whole. I teach a variety of language courses (Latin and Greek), Roman history, as well as special topics courses in Latin literature, mythology, and Ancient Greek and Roman Science. In these courses, I often try to incorporate students in public humanities projects that can be appreciated by a wider audience. My Ancient Science class produced a website about their projects, and a Latin class on Horace helped to design a student commentary to his Epistles. While most of my published work is about Roman topics, my favorite place on earth is the island of Aegina, and I recently curated an exhibition about this island at the Terrell Main Library.

Fall 2024

Elementary Latin — LATN 101
Intermediate Latin I: Ovid — LATN 201
Age of Nero: History and Culture — CLAS 317

Notes

Christopher Trinacty Presented Paper and Participated in Panel About Seneca

October 25, 2023

Professor Christopher Trinacty presented the paper, "Seneca's Natural Questions: Three Perspectives" at the University of Athens. This paper offers a reading of Seneca's work that stresses its rhetorical, literary, and philosophical sophistication. In addition, Trinacty was a featured panelist at the University of Cincinnati's "An Evening with Seneca," where he discussed Seneca's tragedies and philosophical works as well as his complicated relationship with Nero.

Christopher Trinacty Chapter Published in "C.H. Sisson Reconsidered"

January 18, 2023

Professor of Classics Christopher Trinacty recently published a chapter in the volume, C.H. Sisson Reconsidered. The chapter, “Sisson in Exile, or, Versions and Perversions of Ovid’s Tristia”, considers the way that the 20th C. English poet C.H. Sisson utilized Ovid's poetry in his poetic self-representation. Prof. Trinacty also has written the entry for Seneca in the revised Oxford Classical Dictionary.

Christopher Trinacty Publishes A Commentary on Seneca's "Natural Questions"

June 2, 2022

Professor Christopher Trinacty recently published a commentary on Seneca's Natural Questions through Dickinson College Commentaries. This work provides a guide for Intermediate Latin learners to understand and appreciate Seneca's treatise on Stoic physics. In addition, his chapter " 'Oceans Rise, Empires Fall:' Cyclical Time and History in Seneca’s NQ 3,” has recently been published in the volume Myth and History: Close Encounters (DeGruyter). The paper examines how Stoic conceptions of time inform the Natural Questions.

Christopher Trinacty publishes book review

October 15, 2020

Associate Professor of Classics Christopher Trinacty recently published an article and a book review. The article discusses the way that Pliny incorporates Senecan material in his letters. The review is on a recent volume about Senecan intertextuality. 

Christopher Trinacty Publishes and Presents

July 9, 2020

Christopher Trinacty, associate professor of classics, published a short article in Classical Quarterly titled “Memmius, Cicero and Lucretius: A Note on Cic. Fam. 13.1,” which shows how Cicero alludes to Lucretius in one of his letters. He also reviewed the recent books, Cassandra and the Poetics of Prophecy in Greek and Latin Literature by Emily Pillinger in Classical Philology and the Latin of Science for Classical Journal. In addition, he recently presented a paper “Labor in Seneca’s Letters” at the Midwest Classical Literature Consortium, and his chapter, “Tragic Translatio: Epistle 107 and Senecan Tragedy” was featured as one of the 100 most important chapters in the 100 volumes of the Trends in Classics journal series.

News

A Conversation with Chris Trinacty

November 30, 2017

Assistant Professor of Classics Chris Trinacty on falling in love with Seneca’s tragedies, teaching the discipline through digital humanities, and his favorite Latin expressions.