Conference

2026

“The Global Rhetoric of Antiquity”

Summer 2026, University of Oxford

Call for Papers to be released soon!

2025

“Moral Education between East Asian and Greco-Roman Classics“

19-20 June 2025, Ioannou Centre University of Oxford

Both classical Chinese and Graeco-Roman cultures were marked by an intense focus on didactics; in other words, many of the foundational texts of these two traditions were centrally concerned with the instruction of their readers, especially in the moral virtues. This year, the Janus Project is bringing the comparative and connected didactic features of the classical Chinese and Graeco-Roman traditions to the fore, with a particular emphasis on early modern Latin written in or about East Asia. For example: the original Analects (論語) of Confucius aim to teach certain virtues; the Jesuit translation of the Analects in the Confucius Sinarum Philosophus (1687) aims not only to impart these virtues but also thereby to teach a European audience about Chinese philosophy and to strengthen the practice of European-Christian morals. Both the original ancient texts and the early modern Latin corpus generated from them were thus products of cultures deeply invested in moral education. How can wisdom be taught, found, or acquired? What must one do to be or become a virtuous person? What are the necessary ingredients for a happy life or society? How do texts address these questions through their literary form? And, from a modern scholar’s perspective, how easily do these questions and the answers given to them cross cultural and linguistic boundaries? The 2025 Janus Project Conference encourages scholars from a wide-range of specialisms, including but not limited to history, classics, philosophy, comparative literature, and East Asian studies, to join us in exploring these questions.

We are delighted to have Professor Thierry Meynard (Sun-Yat Sen University, Jesuit Translations) and Dr. Jingyi Jenny Zhao (Cambridge University, Comparative Ancient Philosophy) as our keynote speakers.

To register, please fill out this form by 10 June. If you have any questions or would like the link to attend online, please email cynthia.liu@classics.ox.ac.uk.

The programme is as follows:

Thursday, 19 June

Registration and Welcome 1:00

Panel 1 (13:30–15:00): Greek and Chinese Moral Philosophy in Jesuit Sinology

“Educational Strategies in Teaching Moral Virtues: the Case of Confucius Sinarum Philosophus’s Zhongyong (Book II).” Elisa Della Calce and Simone Mollea (University of Turin)

“Daoist Moral Education.” I Xuan Chong (University of St. Andrews)

“On the Stoic elements in Alfonso Vagnoni (高一志)’s educational philosophy.” Yu Wang (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München)

*Coffee and Tea Break (15:00–15:15)*

Panel 2 (15:15–16:45): European Images of China

“Between Talent and Virtue: Shijing’s Dual Role in Ming-Qing Women’s Literary Practices and Its Exoticised Reinvention in Nineteenth-Century European Literature.” Anqi Fang (University of Cambridge)

“Drawing Asian Antiquities into Biblical Time: Comparative Philology and the Re-Sacralizing of Enlightenment Universal History between India and China.” Mrinalini Sisodia Wadhwa (University of Oxford)

“Perfecting Natural Reason: Sir William Temple, Confucianism, and the Quarrel of the Ancients and Moderns.” Yue Zhuang (University of Exeter)

*Coffee and Tea Break (16:45–17:00)*

Keynote (17:00): Thierry Meynard on “The moral and political writings of Alfonso Vagnone in China: The Education of the prince in the Zhiping xixue“

Friday 20 June

Panel 3 (9:30–11:00): Morality Tales and Greek Didacticism in Ming and Qing China

“The Political Life of a Fable: The Belly and the Members from Rome to China.” Giulia Falato (University of Parma)

“Mathematics and Moral Pedagogy in the Qing Court: The Kangxi Emperor’s Study of Euclid.” Andrew Hui (Yale–NUS)

“From miraculous to exemplary: moral reframing of Christian devotional tales in early modern Sino-European interactions.” Valentina Yang (KU Leuven)

*Coffee and Tea Break (11:00–11:15)*

Panel 4 (11:15–12:45): Jesuit Translations and Linguistics

“Shadowing Alvaro Semedo: Chinese Influence on Christian Translations in the Jesuit Missions in Vietnam.” Kim-Bảo Đặng (New University of Lisbon)

“The Use of Latin as an Intermediary Language in Learning Chinese: A Deeper Look into a 17^th Century Latin-Chinese Dictionary.” João Riso (University of Lisbon)

“How the Jesuits learned Confucianism in the late Ming dynasty: the Latin annotations to the Four Books by Francesco Brancati.” Wu Di (University of Lisbon)

*Lunch (12:45–13:30)*

Panel 5 (13:30–14:30): Moral Education between Ancient China and Greece

“Desiring the Virtuous: Comparative Reflections on the Teacher as Moral Ideal in Early Confucianism and the Platonic Symposium.” Hin Ming Frankie Chik (University of Pittsburg)

“On the “Philosophical” Status of Xenophon’s Memorabilia and the Analects of Confucius in Modern Europe.” Matthew Walker (Yale–NUS)

*Coffee and Tea Break: (14:30–15:00)*

Panel 6 (15:00–16:30): Aristotle and Confucianism

“Aristotle the Xunzian: Virtue Politics in Ancient Greece and China.” Xing Hao Wang (University of Chicago)

“Persuasion and Moral Instruction in Aristotle and Han Fei.” Wenzhen Jin (University of Vienna)

“Moral Starting Points in Aristotle and Mencius.” Benjamin Huff (Randolph-Macon College)

*Coffee and Tea Break (16:30–17:00)*

Keynote (17:00): Jingyi Jenny Zhao on “Shaping the Unborn: Prenatal Influence and Maternal Responsibility from Antiquity to the Biomedical Present”.

2024

“Janus: Language and text between East Asian and Greco-Roman Classics”

15-16 June 2024, Ioannou Centre University of Oxford

Over the past decade, a surge of interest in the global reception of Classics has generated a growing body of scholarship that engages with texts and cultures beyond Greece and Rome, especially in Mexico and South America, India, and Eastern Europe. The Janus Project was launched in January 2024 to direct this energy still further east towards another body of texts also known as Classics: the ancient East Asian philosophical and literary canon, and the commentary and pedagogical traditions that grew up around it. The inaugural Janus conference will bring together scholars working on any point of confluence between Greco-Roman and East Asian ‘Classics’. The conference will showcase the breadth and depth of the field, explore the potential for cross-disciplinary collaboration, and build connections within and between specialties.

The conference, sponsored by the University of Oxford Faculty of Classics and Oxford University Press John Fell Fund, will be held 15-16 June 2024 at the Ioannou Centre.

Please direct any questions you may have to the conference organizers, Cynthia Liu and Charis Jo (admin@janus-project.org).

To register to attend in person, please email cynthia.liu@classics.ox.ac.uk by June 7th. The registration fee for in-person attendance, to include coffee/tea and lunch, is £10. If you have dietary requirements, please do let us know by June 3rd.

To attend online, please email cynthia.liu@classics.ox.ac.uk by 14 June.

The programme is as follows:

Saturday, 15 June

Registration and Welcome 12:30

Session 1 Poetry (1:00-2:30)

“Honey and Robots: Reinventing Greco-Roman and Chinese Antiquity in the Poetry of Sally Wen Mao.” Christopher Waldo (University of Washington, Seattle)

“Two Ghosts: Ambivalence and Moderation in Zhou Zuoren’s Reception of Sappho.” Kai Chen (Regent’s College, Oxford)

“Delightful leisure and spiritual freedom: the gardener in comparative perspective.” Beth Harper (University of Hong Kong)

Session 2 Friendship (2:30-3:30)

“A friend in difficult times: Martini Martini’s Qiuyou pian and the reception of Greco-Roman literature in early modern China” Stefano Rebegianni and Lucas Herchenroeder (University of Southern California)

“My Second Half: Matteo Ricci’s Essay of Friendship as an Adaptive Strategies and Its Influence on the Late Ming Literati’s View of Friendship.” Anqi Fang (Wolfson College, Cambridge)

*Coffee and Tea Break (3:30-4:00)*

Session 3 Confucius Sinarum Philosphus (4:00-5:30)

“Literary Memory and Latin Translation of Value Concepts between Western and Eastern Cultures. The Cases of Humanitas and Clementia in the Confucius Sinarum Philosophus (1687).” Elisa Della Calce and Simone Mollea (University of Turin) *online

“World History: European or Universal? Tensions in the Jesuit Confucius Sinarum Philosophus (1687).” Nathan Gilbert (Durham University)

“Neo-Confucianism, Plato, and Christianity: Three Layers in Joseph Edkins’ Biography of Plato.” Jiakai Zhang (University of California, Los Angeles)

*Coffee and Tea Break (5:30-5:45)*

Keynote 1 (5:45-6:45)

“Incomparable? Greece, China, and the Comparative Method.” Alexander Beecroft (University of South Carolina)

Sunday, 16 June

Session 4 Translation (9:30-10:30)

“Latin as obscene censorship in 20^th-century translations of Jin Ping Mei.” Marco Gay (St. Anne’s College, Oxford) and Alberto Di Falco (Zhejiang International Studies University)

“Chinese Translation of Ancient Greek Drama: Three Stages.” Beichen Xing (University of Bristol, Renmin University of China)

*Coffee and Tea Break (10:30-11:00)*

Session 5 Online (11:00-12:00) *online

“Cross-cultural Communication between Stoic and Confucian Ethics —An analysis of Matteo Ricci’ Twenty-five Paragraphs.” Xue Li (Beijing Foreign Studies University)

“Intellectual Liberty during the Han Dynasty: A Comparative Study of the Religious Criticism of Lucian and Wang Chong.” Tengda Ni (Beijing Normal University)

Lunch 12:00-1:30

Practice-based talk (12:00-1:00)

“Translating Latin Poetry into Chinese: Strategies and Examples from Virgil, Horace and Catullus.” Wentao Zhai

Session 6 Zottoli (1:30-2:30)

“Classics in a Time of Crisis: Fr. Angelo A. Zottoli as a Cultural Mediator between Confucianism and the classicità.” Antonio de Caro (University of Zurich)

“Between classic and literature: Zottoli’s prefaces to the odes and his use of Zhu Xi’s interpretations.” Danchen Zhang (University of Warwick)

Session 7 Ancient Greek as Mediator (2:30-3:30)

“Ezra Pound’s Ideogrammic Use of Ancient Greek in his Poetry.” Kristina Chew (Rutgers University) *online

“Laozi’s Logos: Heraclitean echoes in modern Greek translations of the Daodejing.” Dimitra Amarantidou (University of Macau)