The Osterman Common 
Room was packed for a 
moderated discussion with 
author 
Artemis 
Leontis 
discussing her new book 
“Eva Palmer Sikelianos: A 
Life in Ruins” on Thursday 
afternoon. 
The 
event 
was 
part 
of the Author’s Forum 
series 
presented 
by 
the 
LSA 
Institute 
for 
the 
Humanities. 
The 
conversation 
was 
moderated by Prof. Yopie 
Prins.
Leontis’s book is the 
first biography about Eva 
Palmer Sikelianos (1874-
1952), an American poet, 
composer 
and 
dancer 

who extensively studied 
Ancient 
Greek 
history. 
Palmer recreated ancient 
art forms, staging Greek 
tragedy 
with 
her 
own 
choreography, 
costumes 
and even music. She was 
most 
famously 
known 
for reviving the Delphic 
Festivals 
in 
Delphi, 
Greece.
The lecture began with 
Leontis 
discussing 
how 
she had been fascinated 
by Palmer’s body of work, 
but how research on her 
artistic process and life 
had been limited. Leontis 
recalls how after getting 
promoted 
to 
associate 
professor at the University 
of Michigan and having 
the 
resources 
of 
the 
Humanities 
Department 

backing her up, she was 
able to start embarking 
on cataloging the life of 
Palmer.
In the early stages of 
her 
research, 
Leontis 
organized an event that 
brought a poet who had 
personally known Palmer 
to 
campus. 
Baldwin 
shared several personal 
anecdotes 
with 
Leontis 
and 
helped 
shape 
the 
framing of the narrative of 
Leontis’s biography.
“This was not just a 
Greek story ... this is also 
a 
ladies’ 
Greek 
story,” 
Leontis said. “Those two 
pieces 
had 
never 
been 
brought 
together. 
The 
transnational movement, 
women who entered into 
classical studies sort of 
triangled and learned 
Greek 
and 
always 
presented 
themselves 
as amateurs, but had 
felt that their life was 
quite 
interconnected 
with 
their 
one 
in 
Greek.”
Leontis 
said 
her 
research allowed her 
to 
travel 
to 
several 
parts 
of 
Greece, 
including 
Delphi. 
In 
these archives, Leontis 
describes 
finding 
fascinating love letters 
between Palmer and 
her 
husband 
in 
an 
archive.
“Most 
interesting 
and challenging was an 
archive of love letters 
that were the center for 
Asia Minor studies in 
Greece,” Leontis said. 
“So just finding out the 
papers were there was 
an adventure.”
When asked about 
Leontis’s 
feelings 
about Palmer, she was 
hesitant 
at 
first 
to 

respond, as she purposely 
tried not to allow her 
personal feelings to reflect 
in her book.
“I worked very hard not 
to develop a relationship 
with the person, but it’s 
very hard to divorce her 
now,” 
Leontis 
said. 
“I 
think that she would be 
really 
quite 
unbearable 
sometimes. … I think I 
would 
really 
disagree 
with her fundamentally 
on almost everything … 
but I fell in love with her 
stuff.”
LSA sophomore Dana 
Papandreadis said it was 
interesting that Leontis 
started off wanting to 
document Palmer’s life 
but was able to delve 
into 
so 
many 
other 
disciplines.
“It’s really cool that 
she 
dove 
into 
… 
so 
many 
different 
angles,” 
Papandreadis said. “She 
just 
started 
writing 
a 
biography but it hit so many 
different categories.”
LSA senior Tim Bennett 
said the lecture exposed 
him 
to 
a 
completely 
different aspect of Greek 
culture.
“There’s 
a 
whole 
realm of Greek history 
that I just knew nothing 
about. That there were 
even 
these 
festivals, 
these Delphic festivals,” 
Bennett said. “That there 
were these people who 
were bringing aspects of 
American culture, Indian 
culture, to the costume 
design, 
choreography. 
There’s 
archives 
for 
choreography? 
That’s 
crazy.”

2A — Friday, September 27, 2019
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