Overview

***Summer 2020 Greek Mythology students: Click here to get the syllabus and booklist

Click here for my CV. My newest projects are listed below. In the picture, I'm petting Lola at The Farm Sanctuary in Watkins Glen, New York (credit: Jason Koski).

Keywords

Latin Literature, Classics, ancient Rome, ancient Comedy, Plautus, Terence, jokes, puns, wine, Cicero, Virgil, neo-Latin

Departments/Programs

Classics

Graduate Fields

Classics

Research

Latin literature, classical Roman and Greek society, and the Renaissance. Humanism (forest), not philology (trees). Wine, swine, mind, and a good laugh.

Courses

Spring 2020

Fall 2020

CLASS 1615 : Introduction to Ancient Rome

Publications

For a complete list, click here. Book reviews are here.

New Books

1. 2020. Vincent Obsopoeus. How to Drink: A Classical Guide to the Art of Imbibing. Edited, translated, and introduced by Michael Fontaine. Princeton University Press. German translation in progress.

"Weirdly time-travelly” -- The Daily Beast. What's the buzz?

Overview and backstory: Cornell Chronicle
Op-eds: USA Today; Psychology Today
Bonuses and b-sides: The Best American Poetry I, II, III, IV (includes the original preface), V. The history of drinking games: History Today (also Time Magazine). Quarantini recipes: English, Chinese
Podcasts: American Scholar; Royal College of Psychiatrists; The Good Life
Reviews: Wine Spectator; Forbes; The Daily Mail; Times Literary Supplement; The Spectator USA; Atlas Obscura; Literary Review of Canada; Fortress of the Mind; Alexander Adams; The Brew Holder; Classics for All; Literary Review; Mr.&Mrs.Romance; The Mountain Democrat; The Northwest Arkansas Democrat Gazette; The Santa Barbara Independent; The Umami Factor; Washington Examiner; Múlt-Kor; Pennsylvania Literary Journal; The Daily Beast

Is there an art to drinking alcohol? Can drinking ever be a virtue? The Renaissance humanist and neoclassical poet Vincent Obsopoeus (ca. 1498–1539) thought so. In the winelands of sixteenth-century Germany, he witnessed the birth of a poisonous new culture of bingeing, hazing, peer pressure, and competitive drinking. Alarmed, and inspired by the Roman poet Ovid’s Art of Love, he wrote The Art of Drinking (De Arte Bibendi) (1536), a how-to manual for drinking with pleasure and discrimination. In How to Drink, Michael Fontaine offers the first proper English translation of Obsopoeus’s text, rendering his poetry into spirited, contemporary prose and uncorking a forgotten classic that will appeal to drinkers of all kinds and (legal) ages. Complete with the original Latin on facing pages, this sparkling work is as intoxicating today as when it was first published.

2. 2021. Cicero and Quintilian. How to Tell a Joke: An Ancient Guide to the Art of Humor. Princeton University Press.

Cicero, standup guy

New Articles

1. 2020. "Camerarius Camelarius: A New Salt Road to the Modern World." In Thomas Baier and Tobias Dänzer (eds.) Plautus in der Frühen Neuzeit. Tübingen: Narr Francke Attempto. (On the manuscript tradition of Plautus' comedies; allegory painted by Lucy Plowe)