Please note: In order to keep Hive up to date and provide users with the best features, we are no longer able to fully support Internet Explorer. The site is still available to you, however some sections of the site may appear broken. We would encourage you to move to a more modern browser like Firefox, Edge or Chrome in order to experience the site fully.

Horace, Hardback Book

Hardback

Description

Perhaps no classical writer has been so consistently in vogue as Horace.

Famous in his own lifetime as a close associate of the Emperor Octavian, to whom he dedicated several odes, Quintus Horatius Flaccus (65–8 BC) has never really been out of fashion.

Petrarch, for example, modelled his letters on Horace’s innovative Epistles, while also borrowing from his Roman forebear in composing his own Italian sonnets.

The echo of Horace’s voice can be found in almost every genre of medieval literature. And in later periods, this influence and popularity if anything increased.

Yet, as Paul Allen Miller shows, while Horace may justifiably be called the poet for all seasons he is also in the end an enigma.

His elusive, ironic contrariness is perhaps the true secret of his success.

A cultured man of letters, he fought on the losing side of the Battle of Philippi (42 BC).

A staunch Republican, he ended up eagerly (some said too eagerly) promoting the cause of Julio-Claudian imperialism.

Viewed as the acme of Roman literary civilization, he was shaped by his Athens education at Plato’s famous Academy.

This new introduction reveals Horace in all his paradoxical genius and complexity.

Information

£65.00

 
Free Home Delivery

on all orders

 
Pick up orders

from local bookshops

Information

Also in the Understanding Classics series  |  View all

£21.99

£20.59

£17.99

£16.19

£17.99

£16.19

£20.69

£18.62