This is a totally brilliant poem. “One of Horace’s rare failures” is how a book which used to be in the Leicester University library described it – because of the […]
Monthly Archives: August 2012
Aeneid 2.40-56, 203-19 Laocoon and the Serpents (contributed by Anne Dicks)
Studying this passage for ‘O’ level many years ago is what made me choose to take ‘A’ Level Latin and begin my career as a Classics teacher. Anne Dicks, Classics […]
Ovid, Tristia 3.7.31-54 (contributed by Andrew James Sillett)
At the halfway point of his five books of Tristia, the exiled Ovid turns to the themes of lyric and contemplates old age, art and the limits of human endeavour. […]
Sulpicia Poem 1 (contributed by Terry Walsh)
This is a wonderfully triumphant cri de coeur, at once defiant, feminine and feminist; the slight awkwardness of the Latin is touching. Terry Walsh At last love has come, a […]
Cicero de Oratore 2.240, 276 (contributed by Mary Beard)
I have been thinking for a few years about what made Romans laugh (well elite male Romans). The truth is that the most extensive, interesting and funny discussions of ancient […]
Horace Odes 3.29-65 (contributed by Llewelyn Morgan)
The second half of Horace’s very finest lyric – it combines a profound view of how to live life with the most exquisite use of poetic form. Just to give […]
Pindaric Ode by Armand D’Angour
This Pindaric Ode was commissioned by Boris Johnson for the 2012 Olympics and follows Dr D’Angour’s previous ode for the Athens Olympics in 2004. The wordplay is great fun, especially […]
Aeneid 6.847-853 – Virgil’s vision of Roman greatness
Virgil’s vision of Roman greatness put into the mouth of Anchises, the dead father of Aeneas whom Aeneas travels to find in the Underworld in this book – the turning […]