After receiving many high-quality contributions, the FPO engaged in a careful two-stage selection process, first by examining the application materials and second via a Zoom meeting with the four finalists, and is now pleased to announce its very first Hodges doctoral dissertation fellow for the academic year 2021-22: Olga Faccani.
Olga Faccani is a PhD candidate in Classics at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she currently focuses on ancient Greek performance. Her dissertation, Tragic Bonds: Death, Disorientation, and Trauma in Euripides, investigates the process of disorientation caused by death and trauma in the work of Athenian playwright Euripides. By analyzing the ways in which characters re-orient themselves in the aftermath of death and trauma, Olga aims to explore the significance of uncertainty and loss in Greek tragedy, and more generally the ways in which the theater art form enacts the process of disorientation. At UC Santa Barbara, Olga also maintains an active collaboration with The Odyssey Project, a theater program between incarcerated youth and undergraduate students. As part of this experience, the participants reconstruct ancient texts in their own voices, and leverage storytelling to look at their lives through a heroic lens rather than a criminalized one.
View Olga Faccani’s Page