|
|
Books > Language & Literature > Literature: texts > Essays, journals, letters & other prose works > Classical, early & medieval
In 1773, James Boswell made a long-planned journey across the
Scottish Highlands with his English friend Samuel Johnson; the two
spent more than a hundred days together. Their tour of the Hebrides
resulted in two books, A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland
(1775), a kind of locodescriptive ethnography and Johnson's most
important work between his Shakespeare edition and his Lives of the
Poets. The other, Boswell's Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with
Samuel Johnson (1785), a travel narrative experimenting with
biography, the first application of the techniques he would use in
his Life of Samuel Johnson (1791). These two works form a natural
pair and, owing that they cover much of the same material, are
often read together, focusing on the Scottish highlands. The text
presents a lightly-edited version of both works, preserving the
original orthography and corrected typographical errors to fit
modern grammar standards. The introduction and notes provide clear
and concise explanations on Johnson and Boswell's respective
careers, their friendship and grand biographical projects. It also
examines the Scottish Enlightenment, the status of England and
Scotland during the Reformation through to the Union of the Crowns,
and the Jacobite
Originally published in 1930, this book contains the Latin text of
extracts from Sallust, Julius Caesar, Livy, Ovid, and other Latin
prose and verse authors of the late Imperatorial and early Augustan
period. J. G. Worth provides a large vocabulary at the end of the
text, as well as a precis of each of the passages, which were
chosen 'for their intrinsic interest and value', as well as their
status as exemplary pieces of Latin from this time. This book will
be of value to anyone with an interest in Augustan Latin or the
history of Classical education.
First published in 1938, this book forms the second part of a
two-volume edition of the Oresteia. The first volume contains the
original Greek text of the Oresteia with a facing-page English
translation, notes and a detailed introduction. This second volume
is largely composed of a comprehensive textual commentary. A
metrical appendix is also provided. This book will be of value to
anyone with an interest in the works of Aeschylus and classical
literature.
First published in 1938, this book forms part one of a two-volume
edition of the Oresteia. This first volume contains the original
Greek text of the Oresteia with a facing-page English translation
and notes. A detailed introduction is also provided. The second
volume is largely composed of a comprehensive textual commentary.
This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in the works
of Aeschylus and classical literature.
Originally published in 1924, this book contains the Latin text of
the first book of Quintillian's Institutionis Oratoriae.
Quintillian's work on oratorical principles was much respected
during the revival of Classical learning in the Renaissance, but
largely forgotten subsequently. Colson supplies a detailed
exegetical commentary, as well as a thorough history of the
composition of Quintillian's work and its transmission through the
ages. This book will be of value to anyone with an interest in
ancient oratory or in this long-neglected text.
First published in 1900, as the fourth edition of an 1880 original,
this book by John Sandys contains the text of Euripides' chilling
play in the original ancient Greek, as well as a thorough set of
critical notes, a survey of the play's mythological origins, and
many illustrations of Bacchic themes in ancient art. Clearly
presented and easy to read, this book will be of value to Classical
scholars of any ability and to anyone looking for more information
on this celebrated tragedy.
Studies on the Text of Suetonius' De uita Caesarum is a companion
volume to the critical edition of Suetonius' Lives of the Caesars
in the Oxford Classical Texts series, edited by Robert Kaster. It
provides detailed insight into the research and textual analysis
behind the edition. Part I presents the first comprehensive and
accurate account of the medieval manuscript tradition (ninth to
thirteenth centuries) on which the Oxford Classical Text is based,
and Part II analyses hundreds of passages where a variety of
textual problems are encountered, often offering new solutions.
Four appendices provide additional support to the arguments of Part
I, while a fifth lists all the places (just over 300) where the new
text differs from the edition by Maximilian Ihm that has been the
standard since 1907.
Pliny the Younger's nine-book Epistles is a masterpiece of Roman
prose. Often mined as a historical and pedagogical sourcebook, this
collection of 'private' letters is now finding recognition as a
rich and rewarding work in its own right. The second book is a
typically varied yet taut suite of miniatures, including among its
twenty letters the trial of Marius Priscus and Pliny's famous
portrait of his Laurentine villa. This edition, the first to
address a complete book of Epistles in over a century, presents a
Latin text together with an introduction and commentary intended
for students, teachers and scholars. With clear linguistic
explanations and full literary analysis, it invites readers to a
fresh appreciation of Pliny's lettered art.
Originally published as part of the Pitt Press Series in 1921, this
book not only provides the full text of the 21st book of the Iliad,
but also includes an introductory guide for the new Greek scholar
that addresses issues of vocabulary, translation possibilities and
metrical issues. This book will be of value to Classical scholars
of any ability, but particularly to anyone reading Homer in the
original.
Originally published in 1899 as part of the Pitt Press Series, this
book contains the Greek text of Aeschylus' Prometheus Bound. The
tragedy is prefaced with a history of Prometheus in Greek myth and
an attempted reconstruction of the other two plays in the
Prometheus trilogy, of which Prometheus Bound is the only extant
piece, with detailed notes following at the end of the text. This
book will be of value to anyone with an interest in early Athenian
drama.
Originally published in 1904, as the second edition of an 1892
original and part of the Pitt Press Series, this book contains the
Greek text of two of Lucian's satirical dialogues, Menippus and
Timon. The works are prefaced with an introduction to Lucian's life
and style, as well as a thorough commentary on the passages and a
vocabulary list. This book will be of value to anyone with an
interest in the Second Sophistic, ancient philosophy or the works
of Lucian.
Originally published in 1912 as part of the Pitt Press Series, this
book contains the Greek text of the Socratic dialogue Ion. The
edition is prefaced with an overview of Plato's life and career and
an analysis of the key ideas in the text, with detailed notes
following at the end. This book will be of value to anyone with an
interest in Platonic thought.
Benjamin Hall Kennedy (1804-1889) was a celebrated Classicist who
enjoyed great success as a lecturer and as an author; his Latin
Primer is still in use today. In this book, originally published in
1882, Kennedy provides both the original text of Aeschylus'
Agamemnon, the first play in the Oresteia trilogy and one of the
most famous extant Greek tragedies, as well as a metrical English
translation and a broad commentary on, among other topics, the
themes of the play, its metrical construction and variations in the
various manuscripts. This book will be of value to Classics
students seeking a guide to this intricate and influential play.
Originally published in 1882, this book by highly esteemed Syriac
scholar William Wright is an English translation of the text
detailing the history and causes of the Anastasian War between the
Roman Empire and the Persians in the sixth century AD, one of the
earliest preserved historical documents in Syriac. Also included is
a copy of the Syriac source text with scholarly footnotes and
comparisons among the various manuscripts. This book will be of
value to historians of late Antiquity and of the ancient Western
reception of the civilizations of the East.
Originally published in 1896, this book contains the Latin text of
the fourth and last book of Horace's famous Odes, as well as the
famous Carmen Saeculare, written for the Secular Games in 17 BC and
commissioned by the emperor Augustus. Gow includes a biography of
the poet and commentaries on each of the 16 poems in the book,
including a brief synopsis of each, as well as a guide to common
metrical patterns used by Horace and other ancient poets. This book
will be of value to anyone interested in Horace or in Augustan
poetry more generally.
First published in 1932, as the sixth edition of an 1898 original,
this collection of some of Juvenal's satires, including the
often-overlooked sixth satire, was edited and abridged by noted
Juvenal scholar James Duff. Duff begins the book with a biography
of the poet, an overview of satire before Juvenal, as well as an
assessment of the available manuscripts and the rich scholia handed
down from antiquity. The notes include a summary of each satire and
commentary on the text. This book will be of value to anyone with
an interest in Juvenal or the history of satire.
Originally published in 1895, this book contains the Latin text of
the first book of Horace's famous Odes. Gow includes a biography of
the poet and commentaries on each of the 38 poems in the book,
including a brief synopsis of each ode, as well as a guide to
common metrical patterns used by Horace and other ancient poets.
This book will be of value to anyone interested in Horace or in
Augustan poetry more generally.
Originally published in 1888, this book contains the Latin text of
the first book of Horace's Epistulae. Distinguished classicist
Shuckburgh includes a biography of the poet and commentaries on
each of the 20 poems in the book, as well as a brief synopsis of
each letter. This book will be of value to anyone interested in
Horace or in Augustan poetry more generally.
Originally published in 1939, this book addresses the literary
treatises written by Greek historian and rhetorician Dionysius of
Halicarnassus. Bonner studies the scholar's devotion to the
imitation and detailed analysis of the finest Greek examples, and
the hierarchical system in which Dionysius installs them. This book
will be of use to anyone with an interest in ancient rhetoric.
This volume presents a newly edited text of Euripides' Troades,
with a scene-by-scene and line-by-line commentary that brings
centuries of classical scholarship to bear on a wide variety of
questions. These include the interpretation of the play as part of
a trilogy (its companion plays were Alexandros and Palamedes, of
which we have only fragments), the contribution of the various
scenes, speeches, and choral odes to the play, the style and usage
of Euripides, and the stage action of the original performance.
Since the play was performed in 415, shortly after the Athenian
subjugation of Melos, it has frequently been interpreted as a
criticism of Athenian foreign policy. The Introduction provides
numerous converging arguments against this view and also shows that
those who hold it are forced to ignore a greate deal of the text
and cannot account for the Helen episode. The commentary, in
addition to discussing the topics named above, interrogates the
play's intellectual content, topics such as the nature of human
success, vicissitude in mortal life, and the workings of the gods
in the world, and re-evaluates the way the play's first audience
were meant to react to the worldviews of Hecuba and others. It also
examines carefully all the places where the text is insecure,
places where there are significant variants or where what is
transmitted is open to challenge. The book is written with the
needs of both comparative beginners and seasoned classical scholars
in mind.
This anthology presents a selection of texts on Polish socialist
realist literature, written from the early 1980s to date. They
depict a comprehensive picture of this literary phenomenon:
starting from its holistic interpretations, through detailed
analyses of the poetics of literary and political texts and a
presentation of specific, also untypical embodiments of this
artistic doctrine, to descriptions of the functioning of the
institutions of literary life under socialist realism. All the
texts in this anthology share a historically and culturally
determined general methodological perspective, representing a
combination of the Polish version of structuralism in literary
studies - on the descriptive plane - with the anti-communist
attitude on the plane of evaluation of presented phenomena.
Dutch is a peculiar language in that certain nouns have more than
one gender. This first academic study of double gender nouns (DGNs)
in the Dutch language investigates this anomaly. First assigned a
lexicological classification, the DGNs are then analysed
contextually by means of a corpus study. DGNs are shown to be part
of a generalized restructuring of Dutch gender as a whole. No
longer a fringe phenomenon in the Dutch gender system, this study
shows them to be catalysts in the transition towards a (more)
semantic system, a process that is much more advanced than commonly
assumed.
If Greek tragedies are meant to be so tragic, why do they so often
end so well? Here starts the story of a long and incredible
misunderstanding. Out of the hundreds of tragedies that were
performed, only 32 were preserved in full. Who chose them and why?
Why are the lost ones never taken into account? This extremely
unusual scholarly book tells us an Umberto Eco-like story about the
lost tragedies. By arguing that they would have given a radically
different picture, William Marx makes us think in completely new
ways about one of the major achievements of Western culture. In
this very readable, stimulating, lively, and even sometimes funny
book, he explores parallels with Japanese theatre, resolves the
enigma of catharsis, sheds a new light on psychoanalysis. In so
doing, he tells also the story of the misreadings of our modernity,
which disconnected art from the body, the place, and gods. Two
centuries ago philosophers transformed Greek tragedies into an
ideal archetype, now they want to read them as self-help handbooks,
but all are equally wrong: Greek tragedy is definitely not what you
think, and we may never understand it, but this makes it matter all
the more to us.
|
|