Stephanie Ann Frampton

Associate Professor, Co-Head

Stephanie Ann Frampton is an author and scholar who cares deeply about books. A multi-award-winning researcher in the field of Classics, she is author of Empire of Letters: Writing in Roman Literature and Thought from Lucretius to Ovid (Oxford 2019) and numerous essays about the history of books, libraries, and other forms of written heritage from antiquity to today. Her research has been supported by numerous awards, including those from the Loeb Classical Library Foundation, the Bibliographical Society of America, and the Warburg Institute. She is a fellow of the American Academy in Rome and the Rare Book School, University of Virginia.

Subjects

Subjects taught the current academic year:

21L.014 Introduction to Ancient and Medieval Studies (Spring 2025)

21L.611 Latin I (Spring 2025)

21L.612 Latin II (Spring 2025)

21L.613 Latin Readings (Fall 2024)

21L.614 Advanced Latin Readings (Fall 2024)

Subjects taught in recent years:

Research Interests

Trained as a Latinist and a comparatist, I work on the history of the book in Graeco-Roman antiquity and study practices of reading, writing, and scholarship in the classical tradition. I have published on a range of topics in this area, from graffiti in the city of Herculaneum to the history of the Latin library, and on authors from Cicero to Cavafy. My research has been supported by numerous awards, including those from the Loeb Classical Library Foundation, the Bibliographical Society of America, and the Warburg Institute in London. I am a fellow of the American Academy in Rome and the Rare Book School, University of Virginia. My current project is a meditation on the relationship between reading and friendship tentatively titled Words with Friends: Reading Cicero and the Classics.

Publications

Books
Words with Friends: Reading Cicero and the Classics (in progress)

Empire of Letters: Writing in Roman Literature and Thought, from Lucretius to Ovid. Oxford University Press, 2019. Reviewed: The Classical Review, The Classical Journal, The Library, Choice, FORMA Review

Articles and Chapters
“In the Library.” In Alexandra Gillespie and Deidre Lynch eds. The Unfinished Book. Oxford University Press, 2020.

“Graffiti in the So-Called College of Augustales at Herculaneum (Insula VI 21, 24).” In Carlos Noreña and Nikolaos Papazarkadas eds. From Document to History: Epigraphic Insights into the Greco-Roman World: Proceedings of the Second North American Congress of Greek and Latin Epigraphy. Brill, 2019.

“Ovid’s Two Body Problem.” In Matthew Loar, Sarah Murray, and Stefano Rebeggiani eds. The Cultural History of Augustan Rome: Texts, Monuments and Topography. Cambridge University Press, 2019.

“What to Do with Books in the De Finibus.” TAPA 146.1. Spring, 2016.

“‘An Earnest Bending of the Mind’: From studium to studio.” In Peter Benson-Miller ed. Studio Systems. American Academy in Rome, 2016

“Kings of the Stone Age, or How to Read an Ancient Inscription.” In Shane Butler ed. Deep Classics. Bloomsbury, 2016. Reviewed: The Classical Review, BMCR, Classics for All

Book Reviews
Review of George Houston, Inside Roman Libraries (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina 2014). Classical World 109.4. Summer, 2016.

Review of Shane Butler, Matter of the Page (Madison: University of Wisconsin 2011). BMCR. November, 2013.

Other Publications
“Ancient Libraries in Rome w. Dr. Stephanie Ann Frampton,” Ithaca Bound podcast, https://ithacabound.com/podcast/ancient-libraries-in-rome-w-dr-stephanie-ann-frampton/, June 2021.

Commissioning editor, Public Books four-part series on digital humanities, https://www.publicbooks.org/tag/digital-humanities-at-mit/, May 2021.

“Persona: Masks in the Graeco-Roman World,” MIT School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences, https://shass.mit.edu/news/news-2020-pandemic-meanings-masks-classical-literature-stephanie-ann-frampton, September 2020.

“Alexandria in the Googleplex.” Eidolon (https://eidolon.pub/alexandria-in-the-googleplex-or-the-pre-history-of-the-universal-library-cf6a2a5c3198). December, 2017.

“Our Lossy Alphabet.” Public Books (https://www.publicbooks.org/author/stephanie-ann-frampton/). October, 2017.

Talks

“Cicero Graecolatinus,” Renaissance Society of America, Dublin, Ireland, April 2022.

“Textual Mobility and the History of Books,” Society of Fellows in Critical Bibliography, May 2021

“Books as Friends,” Institute for Classical Studies (Online), April 2021

“Auctor/Autor/Author,” Renaissance Society of America (Online), April 2021

“Sulpicia’s Ashes: Literacy and Gender in the Roman World,” Society for Classical Studies (Online), January 2021

“Vade, liber: Textual Mobility and the Poetics of Space in Roman Book Culture,” Spatial Turn, University of Durham (Online), December 2020

“Auctor/Autor/Author,” Centre for the Study of the Renaissance, University of Warwick (Online), November 2020

“Publishing before Publishing,” Boston Athenaeum (Online), March 2020.

“Sententiae Antiquae: Early Modern Commonplace and the Classical Tradition,” Centre for Renaissance and Early Modern Studies, University of York, UK, March 2020

“Cicero’s Topics and the Social Life of Books,” Warburg Institute, London, UK, February 2020