Research
All of his publications have some comparative aspect; among those which may be of particular interest to comparatists are: Byzantine Heroic Poetry (Bristol 1990); Digenes Akrites: new approaches to Byzantine heroic poetry (ed., with Roderick Beaton, Aldershot 1993); Byzantium and the Modern Greek Identity (ed., with Paul Magdalino, Aldershot 1998); and Modern Greek Writing: an anthology in English translation (London 2003). Most recently, he coedited and contributed to The Making of Modern Greece: Nationalism, Romanticism, and the uses of the past (Farnham 2009).
His current research interests include modern Greek poetry in comparative perspective, especially the work of C.P. Cavafy. Recent and current papers cover such topics as: war poetry; Cavafy and the Greek Anthology; Dante in modern Greece; literature and Orthodoxy; and Victorian translations of Homer. Books based on doctoral theses completed under his supervision embrace the themes of literature and religion, formal innovation in verse, prose fiction of the modern city, and the relation between poetry and the visual arts.