Interests
Latin and Greek Literature of the Late Republic and Early Empire (1st century BCE–1st century CE)
Augustan Poetry
Plutarch
Gender Studies in Antiquity (especially sisterhood and representation of female voices)
Intertextuality
Reception
Lien Van Geel received her Ph.D. in Classics in October 2022 from Columbia University, where she continued as an Early Career Fellow in 2022-2023 and as a Lecturer in the discipline of Classics for the 2025-2026 academic year. Her research interests connect two different but related strands: the one being more historiographical, investigating the female experience and literary representations in the Rome of the Late Republic and Early Empire (predominantly in Plutarch); the other being an interest in the Latin poetry (and the female experience within it) with which these women may have engaged. Her dissertation, titled “Soror Augusti: the Literary Lives and Afterlives of Octavia Minor” (Columbia University, advisors: Katharina Volk and Gareth Williams; defended in June 2022) embodies those two strands, from which two book projects, both currently under contract, follow.
Her first book project, provisionally titled “Crafting Roman Women in Plutarch’s Parallel Lives," is under contract with Bloomsbury Academic. The aim of this book is to answer the following questions: how does Plutarch create his Roman women; how does his literary approach compare to that of other historiographers; and how does it affect these women’s reception?
Her second book project, “Augustus’ Kinswomen in Augustan Poetry” (its temporary working title) is under contract with Routledge. The book will be a systematic study of the literary representations of the imperial family of early Julio-Claudians, specifically the female members directly surrounding Emperor Augustus, in Augustan poetry. The depictions of and reactions to these figures by Augustan poets ranging from Virgil to Ovid (but also poets that are not typically included in the Augustan canon, such as Crinagoras) will be the focus.
She has published articles on minor characters in the Aeneid, on female fainting in Homer and Plutarch, and has articles forthcoming on the transformation of the ships to nymphs episode in the Aeneid and the Metamorphoses and on Octavia Minor in Seneca's Ad Marciam. Forthcoming chapters treat the educational presence of Octavia Minor, trans-epic appearances of Cybele, the (im-)perfect deaths of Antony and Cleopatra in Plutarch, snakes and maternal ambition in Plutarch, and Plutarch's depictions of (female) stoicism.
Her language teaching profile leans towards the Latin side (including courses from beginning Latin to advanced level courses such as Augustan Poetry, Classical Prose selections from Cicero and Suetonius, Selections of Cicero's Rhetorical works, and an undergraduate/graduate course on the Aeneid), but she has also taught the full Greek elementary sequence. Her teaching experience beyond classical languages is diverse, including courses such as "The Age of Augustus," “Worlds of Alexander the Great,” “Literature Humanities: Masterpieces of Western Literature and Philosophy,” and “Gendered Mythology: The Ancient Sources and Their Reception.”
Selected Publications
Journal Articles
“Minor Characters and Major Value Shifts: the cases of Pholoe the Cretan slave (Aen. 5.281-5) and Cretheus the Bard (Aen. 9.774-7)” New England Classical Journal. 2024.
“Andromache’s Swoon: The Trope of the Fainting Female from Homer to Plutarch” Archivi delle Emozioni 5.1 Special Issue The Body of Emotions, the Emotions of the Body: Embodied Emotions in Literature. 2025.
[Forthcoming] “From Ships to Nymphs: Cybele’s Maternal Metamorphosis in Aen. 9.77-122 and Met. 14.530-65.” Vergilius.
[Forthcoming] “What Has Octavia Ever Done to Seneca?” Reconsidering Seneca’s Octavia Minor as an Exemplar in Consolatio ad Marciam” Lucius Annaeus Seneca.
[Forthcoming] “The Spanish Ovid Revisited: Three Configured Ovidianisms in Don Quixote” Classical World.
[Forthcoming] “Horace and Crinagoras: Parallels in Augustan Occasional Poetry.” Classical Quarterly.
Volumes/Chapters/Conference Proceedings
2025. “Soror Augusti, non Uxor Ero: Layers of Shifting Centre and Periphery in (and of) the Pseudo-Senecan Octavia.” Annual Meeting of Postgraduates in the Reception of the Ancient World. Center & Periphery in the Classics. Eds. Ianni and Spacciante.
[Forthcoming with Cambridge University Press] “Paideia and Politics: The Case of Octavia Minor.” In Women, Wealth, and Power in the Roman Republic. Eds. Steel and Webb.
[Accepted for Publication] “Tracing and Restoring Cybele the Mother Goddess in Latin Epic.” In “Transtextual Characters in Ancient Greek and Roman Epic: Conceptualization and Case Studies.” Ed. Bär. De Gruyter.
[Submitted for Review] “The (Im-)Perfect Deaths of Cleopatra and Antony in Plutarch’s Life of Antony.” “A Perfect Death? Historical, Literary, and Philosophical Reflections on Life, Death, and Remembrance in Greco-Roman Antiquity."Eds. François and Nijs. De Gruyter.
[Submitted for Review] “Facing “the Great Fear”: Cornelia and Porcia’s Philosophy and Fear in Plutarch’s Pompey and Brutus.” In “Gender and Emotion in the Ancient World.” Eds. Agri and Sissa. Oxford University Press.
[Submitted for Review] “Coiling across the Lives: Snakes and Maternal Ambition in Plutarch’s Lives” In Plutarch and the Natural World. Proceedings of the 13th International Plutarch Society Congress. Brill Plutarch Studies. Eds. Roig Lanzillotta and Leão.
[In Preparation] Edited Volume: War, Peace, and Exempla. Eds. Nijs, van der Wiel, Van Geel.