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Michael Fontaine

Writing

Essays, op-eds, commentary, and other writing for general audiences.

  1. 2026. Father Carolus Egger Goes Hiking in the Dolomites.
  2. 2026. Trump: Brutale Kämpfe zum 80. Geburtstag (video in German). Kulturzeit
  3. 2026. Trump celebrates 80th birthday with an Iran deal and UFC cage fights at the White House. AP.
  4. 2026. Did Ovid Bury Philippi in a Love Story? In Medias Res.
  5. 2026. Was Ovid Really Apolitical? In Medias Res.
  6. 2025. Caesar in the Kremlin: Vladimir Putin’s Speeches in Latin. Antigone.
  7. 2025. What Kimmel and Colbert can learn from ancient comedians who ticked off their leaders. NPR.
  8. 2025. Jimmy Kimmel Ratings Over The Years: He Was No. 1 With Young Adults. Forbes.
  9. 2025. Scholarship, Not Ideology, Guides Western Civilization Curricula. Inside Higher Ed. (nonpaywalled here)
  10. 2025. Lies, Lies, and More Lies in Homer’s Odyssey. In Medias Res.
  11. 2024. On the Obscenity of Ovid. Classical Wisdom.
  12. 2024. Actionable Advice for the Lovelorn from Ancient Rome (a contemporary commentary on Ovid’s Remedies for Love in psychological and psychiatric perspective, in multiple parts). Parts I, II, III, IV, V. Psychology Today.
  13. 2024. Ovid’s 38 Recommendations for Getting Over a Breakup. Ideas.
  14. 2024. E Pluribus Unum. Medium.
  15. 2024. Roamin’ Algeria. Antigone.
  16. 2024. Three Dad Jokes from Ancient Greece for Father’s Day. Medium.
  17. 2024. A Deathless Dialogue. The New Criterion.
  18. 2024. How to Steal From Homer: Duplicative Language in Ancient Greece and Rome. Classical Wisdom.
  19. 2022. Jurassic Marc: Adventures in Decoding Cicero’s Consolation. Antigone.
  20. 2022. On Consolation, Grief, and Coping, and Heaven. Ideas.
  21. 2022. Cicero’s Six Mistakes of Man. Classical Wisdom.
  22. 2022. A New-Old Way of Coping with Grief Mad In America.
  23. 2021. True Grit. The New Criterion.
  24. 2021. Elevator Latin. InMediasRes
  25. 2021. Thirteen Dad Jokes from Ancient Rome for Father’s Day. InMediasRes
  26. 2021. The Real Source Behind “Sic Semper Tyrannis.” InMediasRes
  27. 2020. The Art of Slander: How to Create a Masterpiece, Troll your Enemies, and Win Bigly. Classical Wisdom Litterae (part 1; part 2)
  28. 2020. The Rules of Drinking: The long history of drinking games – and how to win them. History Today and Time Magazine
  29. 2020. Ancient advice for drinking at home during coronavirus self-quarantine. USA Today
  30. 2020. Did Psychosurgery Start out as a Joke? PsychologyToday.com
  31. 2020. The Epic Battle for Mental Health and Inner Peace. PsychologyToday.com
  32. 2019. Where Does Mental Illness Come From? PsychologyToday.com
  33. 2019. The Twisted Tale of The Pig War. InMediasRes.
  34. 2019. Action Figures in Classical Literature. Ezra.
  35. 2019. Classical Lessons in Business Education: What is the Duty of a Company?. LinkedIn. With Devin Bigoness.
  36. 2018. Twitter has become the modern-day Colosseum. Fortune.
  37. 2018. Easter Eggs in the Aeneid. InMediasRes
  38. 2018. Watermarking the Aeneid. InMediasRes
  39. 2018. The Magic Spear Theory of Aeneid 12. InMediasRes
  40. 2018. Back to the Future in Virgil’s Aeneid. InMediasRes
  41. 2018. Secrets of a Lost Art, part 2: Chronograms. InMediasRes
  42. 2018. Secrets of a Lost Art, part 1: Latin Anagrams. InMediasRes.
  43. 2018. Classical Lessons in Business Education: Six Leadership Insights from the Trial of Socrates. LinkedIn. With Devin Bigoness.
  44. 2018. The Mythic Origin of a Famous Wine: The Ballad of Old Falernus. InMediasRes. Translation from Silius Italicus’ Punica 7. (Professional audio reading by voice actor Laura Richcreek added in 2020.)
  45. 2017. (with Skye Shirley) “Classics.” Humanities in Class: How to Think and Learn in the Humanities, 73-104. National Humanities Center.
  46. 2017. “Ergasilus’ Monologue (Plautus, Captivi 69-87).” Translation from the Latin. Minerva Journal, 1.
  47. 2017. “What is the Best Way to Learn Latin?” Moderated conversation on Eidolon.
  48. 2016. “Wine Critics: Everything Old is New Again.” The Huffington Post. With Justine Vanden Heuvel (on Pliny the Elder’s recommendations for wine)
  49. 2016. “Growing Old with Latin.” Moderated conversation on Eidolon.
  50. 2016. ‘Hack your Latin’ series. Medium.com. Six short articles addressed to Latin teachers, students, graduate students, and enthusiasts everywhere: Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6.
  51. 2015. ‘American Bacchae,’ Eidolon.
  52. 2015. ‘Straight Talk on Gay Marriage in Ancient Rome: The Perils of Precedent,’ Eidolon
  53. 2015. ‘Aeneas in Palestine,’ Eidolon. The sincerest form of flattery: A 2018 New Yorker article presents the ideas in this article as its own, without acknowledgment of their true source.
  54. 2014. ‘On the Acronym Origin of the Phrase Hep! Hep!,’ to appear as an appendix to an article published by colleagues at Weill Cornell Medical School.
  55. 2014. Report on the August 8, 2014, ‘Celebration of the Life and Work of Thomas Szasz’, Everson Museum, in Syracuse, New York, for Szasz.com
  56. 2012. ‘Happy End mit Brautschatz,’ Gülzower Gemeindebrief (local church bulletin of Gülzow, Germany) 191 (November 2012, translated from the English by Ilka Weihmann)
  57. 2012. ‘“Goldtopf” in Kopenhagen entdeckt,’ Gülzower Gemeindebrief 188 (February 2012, tr. Mona Eikel-Pohen)
  58. 2002. “Iter Arpinas,” New England Classical Journal 29, 102-3.