In collaboration with Verity Platt and Athena Kirk from the department of Classics, this program centered on myth—through figures such as Dido, Orpheus, and other ancient characters—explores the roots of Western civilization, where many ideas about love, loss, heroism, fate, memory, sacrifice, and the relationship between humans and the divine first took shape.

At the same time, these myths are not only “Western” stories. Their themes can be recognized across many cultures, where similar figures and narratives speak about exile, death, music, transformation, creation, and the search for meaning. In this way, myth becomes a bridge rather than a boundary: a way to understand the origins of Western values while also opening a wider dialogue about shared human questions and the many ways different cultures have imagined where we come from.