Esther Meijer
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esthermeijer.bsky.social
Esther Meijer
@esthermeijer.bsky.social
700 followers 340 following 30 posts
Latinist @ St Andrews. Working on: early imperial & philosophical epistemologies, narratives of incorporation, pleasure/rhetoric/philosophy/patronage. 🏳️‍🌈🇪🇺 Also love: sci-fi, yarny arts, bitterballen.
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esthermeijer.bsky.social
Hello! My new article is now out in Arethusa: '(Re)Producing The Egyptian: Arboricultural Cultivation Of The Roman State In Lucan’s Civil War'.

I consider the epic's tree imagery as metaphor for the Roman state, pointing to the protagonists' attempts at cultivation & propagation.
Screenshot. Text reads: (Re)Producing The Egyptian: Arboricultural Cultivation Of The Roman State In Lucan’s Civil War. Esther Meijer. Abstract: This article examines the changing relationship between Rome and Egypt in Lucan’s Civil War. It applies philological and ideological analyses to the epic’s destabilisation and restabilisation of the body politic of the Roman state as discernible from two interrelated sets of imagery: firstly, the language of arboriculture and propagation as evoked by Virgil’s Georgics and Theocritus’s 17th Idyll; and, secondly, the mortuary treatments applied to Pompey’s body parts. Key to the restabilisation of the res publica is Caesar’s interpretation of Pompey’s remains, which reproduces Egypt as “Other” in relation to Rome while acknowledging its now enduring presence within the empire.
January 14, 2025 at 1:22 PM
esthermeijer.bsky.social
Some tables have turned in unexpected ways, and I am so pleased to be at St Andrews again this upcoming academic year. This time I have brought posters.
Office with a wooden desk in front of a fake fireplace. On the mantel there’s a variety of cards. Above the mantel there’s a whiteboard with pictures of ancient statues. Sunlight comes in through the window on the left.
September 13, 2024 at 10:32 AM
esthermeijer.bsky.social
Followed a print from the 16th century and cross stitched a colourful peacock. 🦚🪡

🔗: collections.louvre.fr/ark:/53355/c...
cross-stitched image of a peacock, facing the audience with his tail on show. the image is pixelated, and done in two colours: the background is purple, and the peacock itself and some plants are a variegated blue green colour. black and white print of the pixelated peacock. Old looking page with some French text on.
July 9, 2024 at 11:57 AM
esthermeijer.bsky.social
Last day on the job. Slightly heartbroken that my contract is ending: I found friends and community in St Andrews, and I will miss my students and colleagues greatly (as well as the bonkers office view over the North Sea). #FTContracts #ECR
My hand holds keys in front of my office door, which has a plaque with the university of st Andrews logo on it as well as my name and title. Two big desks opposite each other in a light room. There’s books on the shelves and trees outside the windows. One of the desks has been emptied. View from the beach towards the sea, with St Andrews’ buildings and church spires on the right. Sunny, a few white clouds in the sky.
June 28, 2024 at 11:22 AM
esthermeijer.bsky.social
I’ve been teaching Tacitus’ Agricola for one of our Latin honours modules @ St Andrews, and I couldn’t resist including an inscription from the Hunterian for tomorrow’s session about freedom and enslavement 🧑🏼‍🏫
PowerPoint slide depicting a relief with inscription and a translation. The relief is in the shape of a triumphal arch. In the middle, a person raises their hand victoriously. Around them, people are kneeling and in chains: they are captives. Translation of inscription is: for the emperor Caesar Titus Aelius Hadrianus Antoninus Augustus Pius, father of his country, a detachment of the twentieth valiant and victorious legion built (this) over a distance of 3000 feet. Found near Hutcheson Hill, West Dunbartonshire, F.1969.22, Hunterian Museum Glasgow.
September 20, 2023 at 5:10 PM
esthermeijer.bsky.social
Wear it while teaching… 🦈
Poster of Shark Tale, the 2004 folk about a small fish who lies about having killed a shark.
August 20, 2023 at 8:13 PM
esthermeijer.bsky.social
The middle of summer seems like a good time to re-try this work/life balance thing. 🐳 Annual leave soon, can’t wait…
Small cross stitch of a whale. It’s half finished and lots of shades of blue. I’m holding it on my lap and the garden is in the background. Selfie of me, a blonde person wearing blue stripey dungarees, glasses and headphones. I’m smiling.
July 30, 2023 at 7:36 PM