
Professor Burnett was a graduate of Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania. She held a master’s degree from Columbia University and a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley.
After teaching at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, Professor Burnett joined the faculty at the University of Chicago in 1961 and was promoted to full professor in 1970. She served as chair of the department of classical languages and literatures from 1969 to 1972. She retired in 1992.
Her latest book was a translation of Pindar’s Odes for Victorious Athletes (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010).


