Mark Golden served on the Editorial Board of Childhood in the Past from the journal's inception until his death in 2020 from pancreatic cancer. Born in Winnipeg, raised in Ottawa, and schooled for each of his university degrees at the University of Toronto, Mark would come to spend the majority of his academic career in the Department of Classics at the University of Winnipeg on the Canadian prairies, a small inner-city undergraduate institution. There, he became a valued teacher, mentor, and colleague; a vocal advocate for students and faculty; and an activist in several organisations in the broader community working to improve social justice. He was best known in the academic world, however, for his pathbreaking scholarship in the overlapping disciplinary areas of ancient Greek childhood, sport, and gender. Mark was the author of many influential books, including Sport and Society in Ancient Greece (CUP 1998) and Greek Sport and Social Status (U of Texas Press, 2008), and co-editor with Peter Toohey of Sex and Difference in Greece and Rome (Edinburgh Press, 1998) and of A Cultural History of Sexuality in the Classical World (Berg, 2011). But readers of this journal may be most familiar with his acclaimed Children and Childhood in Classical Athens (JHUP 1990; second edition 2015) which was the first book-length investigation into Athenian childhood in English, and his many articles and chapters prior and since, including ‘The Second Childhood of Mark Golden,’ a review of the state of the discipline of childhood in ancient Greece and Rome, published in issue 9.1 (2016) of this journal. His work on childhood in classical antiquity, which innovatively drew on sources both textual and material, situated children within the nexus of the relationships that made up family and community life; it traced how children were integrated into social norms to become their replicators, and even sought to get at the emotional responses and contexts in which children were born and raised – or, too often, died.
Mark embodied a unique mixture of what might have struck some as contradictory characteristics. He was casual but never careless, precise but not pedantic. His flair for conveying careful and nuanced scholarship in an easy-going and enjoyable style, whether as published text or delivered paper, ensured that he was an eagerly sought contributor and speaker. Although notorious for his habit of wearing bedroom slippers at work (his colleagues gave him a fresh pair of slippers upon his retirement in 2015, which remained untouched out of loyalty to his old, worn ones; he maintained a similar allegiance to his sweaters), Mark held his scholarship to rigorous standards of precision in presentation, excising extraneous spaces, correcting dashes, and standing by commas he wished to retain against editors’ deletions as though defending friends from assailants. Few could have been friendlier than Mark, but he refused to stand on ceremony and avoided being the centre of attention as a vampire shrinking from the sunlight. (To ensure that he, as the guest of honour, had a good time at his own retirement festivities, not a breath of a speech or toast or even mention of why everyone had gathered was made.) His hundreds of books staggered into piles on the floor of his office when his book shelves could hold no more, but this appearance of intellectual clutter was deceiving: he knew exactly where each book was and what argument it contained. Indeed, his remarkable memory and consequent talent for recollecting (for ever after) the details of conversation, in combination with his outgoing and affable nature, won him countless friends. Although a profoundly productive scholar, he was generous with his time, an energetic mentor of both students and junior colleagues, and an unstinting sharer of his resources, whether these be books, professional connections, scholarly references, or afternoon chocolate and magazines. He was a scholar and a citizen with strong views, but these he balanced with his conviction that contemplation of counter views, respectful discussion, and serious debate were essential. For these characteristics as much as for his publications he was named the Honorary President of the Classical Association of Canada, a position he held from 2018 until his death. Mark's disinclination to reside in echo chambers in his academic work and in his work as a social activist ensure that his death represents a significant loss for the academic world and for the broader community.
Mark was the devoted father of just one child, Max, who was born the same year Children and Childhood in Classical Athens came out in its first edition. Mark fortunately lived long enough to meet his only grandchild, Owen, in the final weeks of his life. He was beloved not only by his colleagues, but by his colleagues’ children, who blossomed under his attentive nature, ease at being silly, and dependable supply of excellent ice cream. He played the piano, and even resumed taking lessons in retirement. A voracious reader of fiction, Mark was an endless source of recommendations, and would habitually read some works of the best-known authors of any country he had plans to visit in order to prepare for his travels. Mark had an undying devotion to the Toronto Blue Jays, never missing a televised game, and travelling with his brother (also a fan) as often as they could to see them play. Mark and his partner Jo-Anne Douglas (a bit less keen on baseball) also enjoyed many travels together over the years, sharing a concord of interests, humour, and on one very soggy evening close to Hadrian's Wall, a pair of yoga tights (technically Jo-Anne's, but worn by Mark). As this example should suggest, he loved to tell a good story, and, in fact, all stories were good stories in Mark's hands. He used to tell the tale of applying for a position soon after graduation at a small American college and receiving a rejection note that read ‘Sorry, but this department is not big enough for the two of us.’ It was signed by the chair, whose name also happened to be Mark Golden. Without offence to the other M. Golden, it would be difficult to imagine that Mark could have been a duplication of anyone else. He has been and will continue to be sorely missed.