Ancient, Classical & Medieval

The History of the Kings of Britain is arguably the most influential text written in England in the Middle Ages. The work narrates a linear history of pre-Saxon Britain, from its founding by Trojan exiles to the loss of native British (Celtic) sovereignty in the face of Germanic invaders. Along the way, Geoffrey introduces readers to such familiar …

Walter of Châtillon’s Latin epic on the life of Alexander the Great was a twelfth- and thirteenth-century “best-seller:” scribes produced over two hundred manuscripts. The poem follows Alexander from his first successes in Asia Minor, through his conquest of Persia and India, to his progressive moral degeneration and his poisoning by a disaf …

Roman poet Catullus wrote with a sensibility so close to our own that sometimes it is hard to believe he was an ancient writer. Translator Ewan Whyte translate a new and contemporary translation of the claasic Roman poet Catullus.

Every poet arrives at some sense of how Language works. Chaucer's engagement, like that of the greatest literary figures, goes beyond the brilliant, skilful use of Language as a tool of expression, beyond what we usually call "talent." He brings to the creative use of signification a sophisticated philosophical questioning of the very nature of Lan …

The date of Beowulf, debated for almost a century, is a small question with large consequences. Does the poem provide us with an accurate if idealized view of early Germanic culture? Or is it rather a creature of nostalgia and imagination, born of the desire of a later age to create for itself a glorious past? If we cannot decide when, between the …

Shelley thought all didactic poetry an 'abhorrence,' and most of the Romantics agreed with this judgment. Critics in this century have been less dismissive of the genre, but seem puzzled by it. There has been a tendency to treat a didactic poem as though it were a kind of lyric, in which the focus of interest lies in the emotions and feelings of th …

This book brings a new approach to the study of the early Greek lyric poets. Instead of concentrating on the poetry as literature, Podlecki has chosen to examine the life and works of the leading poets of the eighth to fifth century B.C. in the context of the military and historical events of the period.