Classics Professor Kathleen McCarthy wins Goodwin Award

By Genevieve Shiffrar, February 11, 2003

  Professor Kathleen McCarthy has received this year's prestigious Goodwin Award of Merit from the American Philological Society. The Goodwin Award recognizes the excellence of a recently published book about the Graeco-Roman world. It is the only, and therefore most important, recognition for classical scholarship in book form. Professor McCarthy's impressive achievement provides the opportunity to showcase cutting-edge research in the Classics Department.

In "Slaves, Masters and the Art of Authority in Plautine Comedy," Professor McCarthy examines ways in which individuals of all strata of Roman society viewed themselves in relation to slaves and to the current power structure. She does this in an innovative way—through analysis of the works of the playwright Plautus.

Plautus wrote at least 20 plays during the turn of the third century to the second century BCE. His plays have a distinctly modern feel, similar to today's television sit-coms. They are silly, bawdy comedies, often constructed loosely to get laughs from the audience rather than designed to carry a plot. Although popular throughout Roman times, Plautus's plays are not what most people associate with Classical literature—they are not considered "the great thoughts of humankind."

The plays are similar in spirit to some of Shakespeare's works (for whom Plautus was an inspiration) and deal with deception tricks or the theme of falling in love with the "wrong" people. A common character for Plautus is the "trickster slave," a stock character familiar in other traditions as well. Professor McCarthy is intrigued with this character and the ways in which audience members did or did not identify with it.

Her book examines the question, "What does it mean in the society to have slave tricksters shown on stage tricking their masters?" To McCarthy, each person in the audience did not simply have a pro or con position regarding the maintenance of the Roman power structure. Rather, she believes that, "each person had elements in his or her social position which favored maintaining the current power structure and elements which favored resistance." Each was on both sides of the fence, simultaneously identifying with the trickster slave as well as disassociating from this character. This duality existed in those highest in the hierarchy—the male citizens—as well as the women, non-citizens, children, and slaves themselves.

Professor McCarthy explains that audience members could identify with the slave because they all had experienced feeling subordinated at least at some point in their lives, and they could embrace the sense of resistance or rebellion that the trickster slave brought to the stage. At the same time, audience members could distance themselves from the character specifically because of its status as a slave. To be a slave is not simply to be downtrodden. Slave status denies an affirmation of one's personhood. Through this duality, Roman society could continue to maintain a fiction that only certain people are subordinated and the rest are free.

Kathleen McCarthy is not the only faculty member in the Classics Department to have received the Goodwin Award. Donald Mastronarde received the award in 1997, and Emeritus Professor K.W. Pritchett won it in 1976. According to Department Chair Robert Knapp, the Classics Department is probably unequalled in its possession of three Goodwin Awards in the last 25 years.

Professor McCarthy, who holds a joint appointment in both Classics and Comparative Literature, credits her students, both undergraduates and graduate students, with helping her develop the book. She says that giving lectures has helped her present the information clearly and convincingly. In graduate level classes, she has tried out ideas and has been challenged by students when they found textual examples that did not support her fledgling theories. She adds, "The graduate students here are amazing. They really push quite hard and this has helped my manuscript."

Undergraduates, too, have benefited much from Professor McCarthy. Students sense McCarthy's warm support in small Latin language courses, but also even in large lecture courses such as "Introduction to Roman Civilization." McCarthy has been especially important to graduate students. Immediately upon her arrival in Berkeley, she became a very successful mentor for graduate students and has directed an impressive number of dissertations.

Teaching has always been an important part of Professor McCarthy's career. After earning her undergraduate degree, she received two years of teacher training and earned her teaching credential. She then taught at the high school level before deciding to return for her Ph.D.

Professor McCarthy explains the career shift towards becoming a professor this way, "I wanted to develop as a writer, and teach, and pursue intellectual ideas in a different context." Having won recognition for the year's best book in Classics, it is clear that Kathleen McCarthy has succeeded very well in fulfilling her goals.

Her next research project? An examination of femininity and narrative in Latin poetry.