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Interview episode on Demetrius Polyarquites with Dr. Charlotte Dunn.

Hello everyone.

Today I have with me Dr. Charlotte Dunn, a lecture in the classics at the School of Humanities and University of Tasmania, Australia.

Dr. Dunn is a specialist of the Hellenistic Age, primarily focusing on the time of Alexander

to the end of the wars of the successors. The scopeistic age, primarily focusing on the time of Alexander to the end of the

wars of the successors. The scope of her research centers largely on the successor dynasties, their political propaganda, and their coinage. She has recently co-authored a book on one of the great players of the time entitled Demetrius the Bessiger, also known as Demetrius Polyarquides. And today she is joining us to discuss her work on

the Kullifurna Antiginid King. So I'd just like to say thank you for coming on to the show. Oh, thank you so much for having me. It's great to be here. I'm really excited to be talking to you about Demetrius today. Well, but before we get to Demetrius, could you talk a bit about your background as to what got you to focusing on the Hellenistic period in general and why did you

ultimately settle on writing a book about Demetrius Polyarquides? about your background as to what got you to focusing on the Hellenistic period in general, and why

did you ultimately settle on writing a book about Demetrius Polyarquides?

Well, I think it started with a fascination with Alexander the Great himself. I particularly

was really intrigued by this personality that this person had and the way in which he was able

to convince people to follow him for so long

and really believe in Alexander's vision. So that sort of took me along the research path

of looking at the propaganda and political image and was really interested in the strategies

of how you present yourself successfully as a king. And that sort of took me down the path

towards looking more into the successes.

And during this time, I was studying at the University of Otago in New Zealand. And that brought

me into contact with Associate Professor Pat Wheatley, who is my co-author on the Demetrius book.

And Pat taught a course on Alexander and he would always conclude this course with Alexander's

death and he would say, you know, this is actually the most interesting period. We're now coming to

the beginning of the Hellenistic age and he always sort of told us he wished he had time to kind

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