Harvard Professor Gregory Nagy delivered a lecture titled "The Three Songs of Demokodos in Odyssey VIII" to the Brandeis community on Feb. 9 as part of the first annual Jennifer Eastman lecture in Classical Studies.Classical Studies professor Leonard Muellner, a student of Nagy's in the 1960s, introduced the "revolutionary" professor and prolific author as the foremost scholar of Greek literature of his generation. Nagy is also Director of the Harvard center for Hellenistic studies in Washington and an award-winning author.

Nagy's lecture focused on his latest research concerning the performance of Homeric poetry in ancient times. Nagy proposed that performance of the Iliad and the Odyssey have evolved throughout time.

"To understand the ancient texts," Nagy said, "you have to make contact with it and it has to make contact with you."

Nagy spoke about the transformation of Homeric poetry from encompassing a variety of epics to including only the Iliad and the Odyssey. These works were performed in Athens until around 520 B.C., Nagy said, when actors could perform nothing but Homeric poetry.

"Homer has become the poet of only the Iliad and the Odyssey," Nagy said.

Classical Studies Chair Prof. Ann Olga Koloski-Ostrow said the annual lecture, which is open to the general public, was made possible through the donation of Jennifer Eastman '68, a lifelong student of the classics.

"Jennifer Eastman gave us her gift to stage lectures...on the importance of Classical Studies in the world at large to all of us," she said.

"The direction of the series is definitely to get cutting edge classicists, classical art historians and archaeologists, or ancient historians and philosophers to come to talk to Brandeis students about their work and the excitement of our field, to engage the students in their research interests and problems," Koloski-Ostrow said.

Koloski-Ostrow said she had hoped the donation would demonstrate to the administration the support that exists for Classical Studies. But she said nothing so far has seemed to have "captured the attention of the administration."

"The lecture series will continue to give the department more visibility," she said.