Biography
Diederik Burgersdijk is a lecturer in classical literature and ancient history. He read classics at the University of Amsterdam, and took his PhD in 2010 on a study about style and structure of the Historia Augusta, a series of late Roman imperial biographies. He specialized in literature and history of the Later Roman Empire, on which he published widely in numerous books and journals. Burgersdijk is Chairman of the Dutch Classical Society (NKV, founded 1938), and moderator at Academic Cultural Center Spui25.
The scope of his scholarship lies in the cultural interactions in the western Mediterranean era, with a focus on texts about imperial history. Within this context, he founded the Zenobia Foundation (in 2008), aiming at the study of interconnections and cultural exchange between East and West from Antiquity onwards. In addition, Burgersdijk has been member of the board and editor of Talanta, Journal of the Dutch Archaeological and Historical Society (http://www.talanta.nl/, 2008-present) and the Brill series Cultural Interactions in the Mediterranean (https://brill.com/view/serial/CIM). He is affiliated researcher at the University of Amsterdam and Radboud University, and taught at several universities and grammar schools, presently at Utrecht University and Cartesius Lyceum.
As a post-doc researcher at Radboud University, Burgersdijk is involved in an international project studying twelve 4th century AD Latin Panegyrics, for which he is rewarded a VENI grant from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). He also acted as boardmember and Chairman of the Society for Talent Scheme Laureates (VVViO).
(Edited) Books
- 2019 Animula vagula blandula. Een collectie van 40 vertalingen en bewerkingen verzameld door Diederik Burgersdijk, Nijmegen: Carptim, 64 pp.
- 2018 (with A. Ross) (eds.) Imagining Emperors in the Later Roman Empire (Cultural Interactions in the Mediterranean 1), Leiden / Boston: Brill 2018, 354 p.
- 2018 De Sluipwesp en de Leliën. Over geloof en ongeloof in de klassieken, Amserdam: Athenaeum, Polak & Van Gennep, 204 pp.
- 2017 D. Burgersdijk, R. Calis, J. Kelder, A. Sofroniew, S. Tusa & R. van Beek (ed.) 2017: War and Storm. Treasures from the Sea around Sicily. Zwolle: W Books (204 p.) [Reprint of Sicily and the Sea].
- 2016 De macht van de traditie. Het keizerschap van Augustus en Constantijn, Amsterdam: Athenaeum, Polak & Van Gennep, 246 pp.
- 2015 D. Burgersdijk, R. Calis, J. Kelder, A. Sofroniew, S. Tusa & R. van Beek (ed.) 2015: Sicily and the Sea. Catalogue Allard Pierson Museum, Amsterdam in cooperation with the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford; Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, Copenhagen; Landesmuseum, Bonn, Museo Archeologico Regionale "Antonio Salinas", Zwolle: W-Books 2015.
- 2015 D. Burgersdijk, W. Henkelman & W.Waal (eds.) 2013 Alexander en Darius. De Macedoniër in de spiegel van het Nabije Oosten (Zenobiareeks I), Hilversum: Uitgeverij VerLoren, 267 pp..
- 2011 D. Burgersdijk & W. Waal (eds.) Constantinopel. Een mozaïek van de Byzantijnse metropool (Mededelingen en Verhandelingen van het Voorzatiatisch-Egyptisch Genootschap Ex Oriente Lux 36), Leuven / Leiden: Ex Oriente Lux, 261 pp.
- 2010 Style and Structure of the Historia Augusta, PhD University of Amsterdam (online, see https://dare.uva.nl/search?field1=keyword;value1=burgersdijk;docsPerPage=1;startDoc=1).
- 2010 D.W.P. Burgersdijk & J.A. van Waarden (eds.) Emperors and Historiography. Collected Essays on the Literature of the Roman Empire by Daniël den Hengst (Mnemosyne Supplements 319), Leiden / Boston: Brill, 263 pp..
- 2008 D. Burgersdijk (ed.) ‘Zenobia van Palmyra. Vorstin tussen Europese en Arabische traditie’, Armada 53, 104 pp.
Chapters and Articles (Peer-Reviewed)
- 'Symposium to Celebrate the Completion of the Ammianus Commentary: Leiden, Rijksmuseum van Oudheden 9 April 2018', Bollettino di studi latini XLVIII fasc. II, 2018, 248-9.
- 'Constantine’s Son Crispus and His Image in Contemporary Panegyrical Accounts', in: Imagining Emperors in the Later Roman Empire (Cultural Interactions in the Mediterranean 1), Leiden / Boston 2018, 137-57.
- 'Aurelius Victor, Festus and the Others. Minor Historians and Anonymous Sources in the Historia Augusta’, Historia Augusta Colloquium Dusseldorpiense (Munera) Bari 2017, 34-46.
- 'Creating the Enemy. Ammianus Marcellinus' Double Digression on Huns and Alans (Res Gestae 31.2)', in: Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 59.1 (2016) 111-32.
- ‘Qui vitas aliorum scribere orditur. Narratological Implications of Fictional Authors in the Historia Augusta’, Writing Biography in Greece and Rome: Narrative Technique and Fictionalization, Cambridge 2016, 240-58.
- ‘Images and Emperors in the Fourth Century AD’, Bollettino di Studi Latini, 46.1 2016, 242-51.
- ‘La présence de Salluste dans l’Histoire Auguste’, Historiae Augustae Colloquium Nanceiense (Munera 39) Bari 2014, 111-27.
- ‘Virgil in French Romanticism. Parallel Novels by Benjamin Constant and Mme. De Staël’, Proceedings of the Virgil Society 28 (2014) 141-72.
- ‘De structuur van de Historia Augusta’, Lampas 46 (2014) 138-57.
- ‘Praise through letters: Panegyrical Strategies in Eusebius’ Life of Constantine and the Historia Augusta’, Talanta XLV (2013): ‘Praising the Otherness. Linguistic and Cultural Alterity in the Later Roman Empire: Historiography and Panegyrics’, 25-40.
- ‘Pliny’s Panegyricus and the Historia Augusta’, Arethusa 46 (2013) 289-312.
- 'De overlevering van Nepos' De excellentibus ducibus exterarum gentium ', Kleio 37.2 (2008) 65-78.
- 'Nepos in der Historia Augusta ', Historiae Augustae Colloquium Bambergense, Bari 2007, 95-107.
- 'Zenobia's biography in the Historia Augusta ', Talanta 36/37 (2005) 139-51.
- 'Enjambement in Aeneis 4', Lampas 36.3 (2003) 167-87.
- 'Een nieuwe Caesar. Over het onderzoek naar 'lezersturing' in De Bello Gallico ', Lampas 34.3 (2001) 242-60.
Moderator at Spui25
Chair at Spui25, Cultural-Academic Centre of the University of Amsterdam, on the following programs: Religieus fanatisme in de oudheid (14 March 2017, Religious fanatism in Antiquity); Fascisme in Nederland (25 April 2017, Fascism in the Netherlands); Egyptomanie (8 May 2017, Egyptomania); Nederlands Brazilië (17 May 2017, Dutch Brazil); 70 jaar Holland Festival (23 June 2017, Holland Festival 70 years); Frank Lodeizen (5 October 2017, at the occasion of his biography); Anchoring Innovation: Techniek (29 January 2017); Thomas Macho, Varkens: een cultuurgeschiedenis (6 April 2018; a cultural history of pigs); Het verhaal van Koning Apollonius – een Latijnse roman (27 June 2018; about the Latin novel); Glenn Most and the Accessibility of Classical Texts (18 September 2018; about the newest additions to the Loeb series); De dertigjarige oorlog (5 October 2018; the Thirty Years War, with Dick Harrison); De verbeelding van de Romeinse Keizers (29 November 2018; Imagining Emperors in the Later Roman Empire); Wie is er bang voor wiskunde? (13 december 2018; Who is afraid of Math?); Waar was ik toen ik er niet was? De filosofie van persoon en identiteit (14 January 2019; with Monica Meijsing); Empire of Cotton: The Global Origins of Modern Capitalism (18 January 2019; with Sven Beckert); Groots en meeslepend. De gedichten van H. Marsman (22 January 2019; about Marsmans poetry, with Jaap Goedegebuure and Abdelkader Benali); Porgy and Bess, George Gershwin (in cooperation with DNO 21 januari 2019); Juditha triumphans, Antonio Vivaldi (DNO 6 februari 2019); Fin de partie, Samuel Beckett / György Kurtág (i.s.m. DNO 25 februari 2019); Het Zwanenmeer, Pjtor Iljitsj Tsjaikovski (DNO 25 maart 2019); Tannhäuser, Richard Wagner (DNO 15 april 2019); Pelléas et Mélisande, Claude Debussy (DNO 11 juni 2019).