Oxford Approaches to Classical Literature (Series Editors: Kathleen Coleman and Richard Rutherford) introduces individual works of Greek and Latin literature to readers who are approaching them for the first time. Each volume sets the work in its literary and historical context, and aims to offer a balanced and engaging assessment of its content, artistry, and purpose. A brief survey of the influence of the work upon subsequent generations is included to demonstrate its enduring relevance and power. All quotations from the original are translated into English.

Ovid's...

Cicero's speech on behalf of L. Lucinius Murena, newly elected to the consulship of 62 BCE but immediately prosecuted for electoral bribery, is especially famous for its digressions and valuable for its insights into the complex political wrangles of the late 60s. It is, however, a speech more commonly excerpted and cited than read in its entirety, though whether the absence of an English-language commentary is a cause or effect of that situation remains uncertain. In short, a pedagogical commentary on this important and strange speech is long overdue.

Distinguished Latinist Elaine...

Diese Sozialgeschichte der klassischen römischen Literatur setzt Standards für alle herkömmlichen Literaturgeschichten. Wer waren die Leserinnen und Leser? Welche Bildung hatten sie und wie kamen sie an die Bücher? Unter welchen Bedingungen und nach welchen Vorbildern wurde Literatur produziert? Die Autorin vermittelt Hintergrundwissen zur Lektüre der lateinischen Klassiker.

Based on Elaine Fantham's 2004 Robson lectures, Latin Poets and Italian Gods reconstructs the response of Roman poets in the late republic and Augustan age to the rural cults of central Italy. Study of Roman gods is often limited to the grand equivalents of the Olympian Greek deities such as Jupiter, Mars, and Juno. However, real-life Italians gave a lot of their affection and loyalty to humbler gods with no Greek equivalent: local nymphs who supplied healing waters, the great Tiber river and other lesser rivers, the lusty garden god Priapus, and more. Latin Poets and Italian Gods surveys...