The Epistles of Horace: Bilingual Edition - Softcover

Horace

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0374528527 ISBN 13: 9780374528522

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002

Synopsis

My aim is to take familiar things and make
Poetry of them, and do it in such a way
That it looks as if it was as easy as could be
For anybody to do it . . . the power of making
A perfectly wonderful thing out of nothing much.
--from "The Art of Poetry"

When David Ferry's translation of The Odes of Horace appeared in 1997, Bernard Knox, writing in The New York Review of Books, called it "a Horace for our times." Now Ferry has translated Horace's two books of Epistles, in which Horace perfected the conversational verse medium that gives his voice such dazzling immediacy, speaking in these letters with such directness, wit, and urgency to young writers, to friends, to his patron Maecenas, to Emperor Augustus himself. It is the voice of a free man, talking about how to get along in a Roman world full of temptations, opportunities, and contingencies, and how to do so with one's integrity intact. Horace's world, so unlike our own and yet so like it, comes to life in these poems. And there are also the poems -- the famous "Art of Poetry" and others -- about the tasks and responsibilities of the writer: truth to the demands of one's medium, fearless clear-sighted self-knowledge, and unillusioned, uncynical realism, joyfully recognizing the world for what it is.

About this title

Book Description

Including an introduction and commentary, this volume of Horace's imaginary letters in verse represents the Roman poet's most original contribution to Latin literature. The commentary pays particular attention to the language's poetic qualities in the course of providing comprehension help with the language.

From the Back Cover

This volume comprises an edition with introduction and commentary of the first book of Horace's Epistles. These imaginary letters in verse represent the poet's most original contribution to Latin literature.

About this edition

• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0374528527
• ISBN 13: 9780374528522
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 224