A university has been ridiculed for advising students to seek support from welfare services if they find studying Greek mythology too distressing.
Critics have accused the University of Exeter of ‘losing the plot’ after it issued a trigger warning for undergraduates studying the Ancient Greek poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey.
Students taking the module Women In Homer are advised at the beginning of the course that they might find the material ‘uncomfortable and challenging’, particularly the references to infant mortality, rape and sexual violence.
They are also advised that if the subject is ‘causing distress’, they should ‘feel free to deal with it in ways that help (eg to leave the classroom, contact Wellbeing, and of course talk to the lecturer)’.
But last night, former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who has drawn on the classics throughout his career and is a fan of Homer’s works, called on the university to withdraw its ‘absurd’ warning.
Mr Johnson said: ‘Are they really saying that their students are so wet, so feeble-minded and so generally namby-pamby that they can’t enjoy Homer?’
The Iliad and the Odyssey, which were written in the seventh or eighth century BC, are inspired by the Trojan War of Greek myth and are populated by gods and monsters.
The Iliad was set in the dying weeks of the siege of Troy and charts the rivalry between King Agamemnon and the heroic Achilles.
Critics have accused the University of Exeter (pictured) of ‘losing the plot’ after it issued a trigger warning for undergraduates studying the Ancient Greek poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey
Pictured: A Trojan horse is shown in a scene from 2004 action film Troy starring Brad Pitt
Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who has drawn on the classics throughout his career and is a fan of Homer’s works, called on the university to withdraw its ‘absurd’ warning
The Odyssey, which in 2018 was voted the greatest story ever written, chronicles the ten-year journey home of Odysseus King of Ithaca at the end of the conflict.
Details of the advice to students were obtained by this newspaper under Freedom of Information laws.
Last night, Lord Andrew Roberts said: ‘University ought to be a time when young people are stress-tested for the real world, which can be a shocking place, not wrapped in cotton wool and essentially warned against ancient but central texts of the Western canon.’
Frank Furedi, emeritus professor of sociology at the University of Kent, said: ‘Poor old Homer. A university that decides to put a trigger warning on Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey has become morally disoriented to the point that it has lost the plot.
‘It is obvious that this university is unaware of the temporal distinction between the present and past and regards these foundational mythologies as if they are contemporary statements about the world.’
Jeremy Black, the author of A Short History Of War, said: ‘Trigger warnings proliferate like knotweed and the latest, on Women In Homer at Exeter, can surely only be a parody.
‘Homer’s work on the Trojan War inherently focuses on violence and is realistic precisely because heroism and cruelty are shown to be related.
‘There is no need for the emotional incontinence of walking out of lectures.’
A spokesman for the University of Exeter said: ‘The university strongly supports both academic freedom and freedom of speech and accepts that this means students may encounter views and content that they may find uncomfortable during their studies.’
The spokesman added content warnings ‘help ensure students who may be affected by specific issues are not subjected to any potential unnecessary distress’.