STORIES · IDEAS · CREATIVE PARTNERSHIPS

The art of making old things new.

I’m drawn to people who believe that beauty, craftsmanship, and imagination can enrich everyday life. Whether in literature, architecture, music, clothing, or design, I admire creators who bring something genuinely worthwhile into the world through exacting attention to detail, sound judgment, honest materials, and innovation rooted in tradition.

My own work follows the same impulse: recovering overlooked ideas, neglected texts, and enduring traditions, finding new ways to bring them to life, and discovering whether others share my sense of their value. I’m especially drawn to creators who take the risk of bringing their vision to market, trusting that others will recognize its value and be willing to pay for what they make. I enjoy collaborating with people who care not merely about what they make, but about the joy, dignity, and meaning it can bring to others. I want to participate in this culture of making, not merely admire or acquire its products, because I believe that making beautiful and useful things contributes to human flourishing.

Much of my work begins with original sources. Decades spent reading Latin, Greek, Italian, German, and French have given me access to stories that rarely reach English-speaking audiences. I enjoy finding those overlooked histories, recognizing what makes them compelling, and bringing them to life for a wider public all across the world.

Creative partnerships

I am drawn to founders, independent publishers, and heritage businesses who have something distinctive to offer the world—and who believe that its story is part of its value. I especially enjoy helping discover the central idea, sharpen its identity, and present it to a new audience. My interest is in the creative and intellectual partnership, not operational management.

If you are building something rooted in history, craft, literature, or a distinctive cultural tradition, I would be glad to hear about it. Get in touch.

One of the things I enjoy most is finding something fascinating that has been forgotten, overlooked, or misunderstood—and bringing it back to life. Sometimes that means recovering a lost work of literature. Sometimes it means discovering an extraordinary historical document, image, or story. The scholarly work is only part of the pleasure. I love finding the people, partnerships, and creative possibilities that can carry a discovery beyond the academy and into the wider world.

Selected projects

Ancient literature, newly imagined

In How to Drink, I brought a little-known Renaissance Latin poem to modern readers as a book about an enduring human pleasure. In How to Tell a Joke, I drew on Cicero’s reflections on humor and gave them a new presentation for an audience far beyond Classics. These books belong to Princeton University Press’s series of ancient guides to modern life. The selection, framing, introductions, and visual identity matter to me as much as the translations.

I’ve also composed original Latin poetry for my books and worked closely with graphic artists to develop illustrations that complement the texts. The Pig War and How to Drink offer examples of both. These collaborations are among the most enjoyable parts of my work, and I’m always interested in pursuing more of them. I believe strongly in the value of human imagination and craftsmanship, and have no interest in using AI-generated artwork as a substitute.

Rediscovering Roman Algeria

In Roamin’ Algeria, a photographic essay coauthored with my brother Richard for Antigone, we explored some of the Roman world’s most spectacular and least visited archaeological sites. Combining photography, Latin inscriptions, historical commentary, and a little humor, we tried to convey the extraordinary beauty of Algeria’s ancient cities—and the excitement of encountering a largely overlooked part of the classical world firsthand.

Making Latin a living experience

I helped develop and champion spoken-Latin programming with the Paideia Institute, at a time when the idea of people actually speaking Latin still seemed improbable to much of the academic world. What interested me most was bringing a cultural possibility to life—and seeing people embrace it. Fifteen years later, there are now thousands of people who speak Latin—and many of them better than me!

Bringing Forgotten Comedies Back to Life

In 2015, I published an edition and translation of the remarkable Latin comedies of Joannes Burmeister, a seventeenth-century German pastor who transformed the bawdy plays of Plautus into biblical stories. His Aulularia was among them, an unknown unknown that I stumbled on purely by accident. But one play, Asinaria (1625), had been lost for centuries—until the only known surviving copy resurfaced in Warsaw in 2026. It’s the kind of story I love: forgotten literature, an extraordinary survival, and a second life for something almost nobody knew existed. Explore the discovery and its reception. And the hunt for his elusive Mater Virgo continues.

Cracking a Medieval Code of Palindromes

This is the result of a longstanding collaboration with a brilliant independent scholar. We’ll have more to say soon.

The Making of the Modern Alps

My current writing follows neglected Alpine voices, places, and traditions—from the Vatican Latinist Carolus Egger and his journeys through Tyrol and the Dolomites to the histories embedded in Alpine material culture and foodways. Read about Egger in the Dolomites or his journey to Innsbruck. Further essays are in preparation.

Rediscovering Heinrich Berann’s Alpine Panoramas

The Austrian artist and cartographer Heinrich Berann transformed mountain landscapes into extraordinary panoramic maps, combining geographical precision with an almost cinematic sense of scale. I’ve been tracking down examples of his Alpine work, including a remarkable historical panorama of South Tyrol that I arranged to have professionally scanned at high resolution. I’m interested in preserving and bringing renewed attention to these works, which capture not only the geography of the Alps but also the imagination of the artists who taught generations of travelers how to see them. A far-off dream would be to help curate an exhibition devoted to Berann’s panoramas.

Inside Jim Steinman’s House

I consider Jim Steinman the greatest musical genius in twentieth-century American history. Steinman attended Amherst College, where I began my teaching career in 2003–2004. In 2025, I was given a guided tour of his remarkable Connecticut home, then being considered for conversion into an artists’ and musicians’ residence. I took an extensive series of photographs documenting the insane rock-star property—complete with bat sconces and velvet everywhere—and the extraordinary imagination of the man who created it. A photographic essay may follow.

Reimagining the Austrian Loden Jacket

What does it mean to make a traditional Alpine garment authentic to its origins and relevant to life today? I’m working with the traditional Austrian loden manufacturer Lodenwalker to reimagine one of its classic hunting jackets (Jagaloden) for contemporary wear in upstate New York, preserving the craftsmanship, materials, and regional character that make it distinctive. Alongside the design project, I’m translating a Latin account of a journey through the region dating to 1428. That traveler’s perspective helps place the garment and its makers in a much longer history of Alpine movement, work, and tradition.

Ideas Looking for Partners

Bringing a Lost 1625 Comedy Back to the Stage

In 2026, the only known surviving copy of Joannes Burmeister’s Asinaria (1625) resurfaced at the National Library of Poland in Warsaw after being considered lost for centuries. It is a remarkable theatrical experiment: a bawdy Roman comedy by Plautus transformed into an equally outrageous biblical story. After years of studying Burmeister, I would love to see the play performed—ideally in Warsaw, where it survived and resurfaced, or Lüneburg, where it was printed. Better still, both! Any performance language would be welcome. I’m a scholar, not a theater professional, and would love to collaborate with directors, translators, dramaturgs, theater companies, or cultural institutions interested in bringing it back to life. The play has survived four centuries. It’s time to put it back on stage.

The Psychomachia Project: An Ancient Epic Reimagined as a Video Game

What if one of the strangest poems of late antiquity became a fighting game?

In How to Have Willpower, I introduced modern readers to Prudentius’s Psychomachia, a spectacular allegorical poem in which Virtues and Vices–all of whom are women–do violent battle for control of the human soul. I’ve long thought its extraordinary characters and violent confrontations could inspire a fighting game in the spirit of Mortal Kombat.

I’d welcome a conversation with a creative game developer or studio interested in exploring the possibility.