Synopses & Reviews
Completely accessible but thought-provoking introduction to one of the greatest of Latin poets, Lucretius.
Synopsis
This Companion is both an introduction to, and a series of thought-provoking essays on, one of the greatest of Latin poets, Lucretius. His poem, 'On the Nature of Things', on the materialist atomist philosophy of Epicurus, was a controversial and seminal text in the history of western literature, thought, and science from the time of the poem's rediscovery in 1417 to modern times. This book gives equal space to Lucretius' ancient contexts and to his post-classical reception and is accessible to the reader who has only read Lucretius in translation.
Table of Contents
Introduction Stuart Gillespie and Philip Hardie; Part I. Antiquity: 1. Lucretius and Greek philosophy James Warren; 2. Lucretius and the Herculaneum library Dirk Obbink; 3. Lucretius and Roman politics and history Alessandro Schiesaro; 4. Lucretius and previous poetic traditions Monica Gale; 5. Lucretian architecture: the structure and argument of the De rerum natura Joseph Farrell; 6. Lucretian texture: style, metre and rhetoric in the De rerum natura E. J. Kenney; 7. Lucretius and later Latin literature in antiquity Philip Hardie; Part II. Themes: 8. Lucretius and modern science Monte Johnson and Catherine Wilson; 9. Moral and political philosophy: readings of Lucretius from Virgil to Voltaire Reid Barbour; 10. Lucretius and the sublime James Porter; 11. Religion and enlightenment in the neo-Latin reception of Lucretius Yasmin Haskell; Part III. Reception: 12. Lucretius in the middle ages Michael Reeve; 13. Lucretius in the Italian Renaissance Valentina Prosperi; 14. Lucretius in early modern France Philip Ford; 15. Lucretius in the English Renaissance Stuart Gillespie; 16. The English voices of Lucretius from John Evelyn to John Mason Good David Hopkins; 17. Lucretius in the European Enlightenment Eric Baker; 18. Lucretius in Romantic and Victorian Britain Martin Priestman; 19. Lucretius and the moderns Stuart Gillespie and Donald Mackenzie.