Rhodes Student wins Top National Competition

Helen Lenahan (g14L0854), currently registered for Classics Honours in the Classics section of the School of Languages and Literatures at Rhodes, has won two prestigious national competitions hosted by the Classical Association of South Africa (CASA).

Helen has been awarded the first prize in the 2016 CASA national essay competition for her essay entitled----“Mighty hunters of mankind”: the influence and subversion of the Classical hero in Milton’s Satan. In addition, she has been awarded joint first prize in the CASA translation competition for her translation into Latin of an extract from a speech by Sojourner Truth about women’s rights, which she linked to the rape culture protests.

Helen is the second person in the history of the competitions to win both prizes in one year: she is the first Rhodes student since 2004 to win the essay competition, and the only Rhodes student ever to win the translation prize, which she is to share with Evert Pistorius of the 老虎机游戏_pt老虎机-平台*官网 of the North-West, who translated Vergil’s first Eclogue into Afrikaans.