The Cambridge Companion to Catullus

Comprehensive coverage, accessible to students and non-specialists, of one of the most popular poets of classical antiquity.

Aimed not only at a broad readership of classical scholars and students but also at all those interested in one of the most loved and influential poets of ancient Rome. Discusses Catullus' poetry, his late-republican background, and his scholarly and literary reception.Catullus is one of the most popular poets to survive from classical antiquity. Above all others he seems to speak to modern readers with a modern voice. The distinguished contributors to this Companion discuss the principal subjects which drew Catullus' affection and disgust, above all his famous affair with the woman he calls 'Lesbia', and situate him in the social, historical and intellectual context of first-century BC Rome. One of the so-called 'new poets', Catullus had a profound effect on subsequent Latin poetry, and this is explored especially for the Augustan age and the late first century AD. A significant part of the volume is concerned with Catullus' survival into the modern world. There are discussions both of the manuscript tradition and of the interpretative scholarship which has been devoted to his poetry, as well as his reception by renaissance and later poets. Students in particular will appreciate this book.