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3.69 AVERAGE
3.69 AVERAGE
Probably one of my favorite books I have ever read
emotional
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
N/A
Strong character development:
N/A
Loveable characters:
N/A
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
N/A
I am officially in my Virgil era.
This edition of The Eclogues provides the Latin on the facing page; I wish I had time to sit down and try to translate them myself, but it was fun to compare bits and pieces of the Latin with the given translation.
Now on to The Georgics.
adventurous
lighthearted
relaxing
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
N/A
Strong character development:
N/A
Loveable characters:
N/A
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
N/A
lighthearted
reflective
relaxing
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
N/A
Poetry, rustic,
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I don't want the 3.75 rating to convey a sense of disappointment, or - worse - to denigrate Virgil's obvious poetic skill. I only mean that (unless you're a classics major or otherwise passionate for bucolic poetry) this is not a pleasure read for a 21st-century English-speaking audience. Virgil's skill, I think, is not in content but in construction; the beauty is in the language itself and how he molds it to fit Latin dactylic hexameter. The Eclogues are beautiful, but translating them diminishes their beauty almost beyond reach for a casual reader.
(NB: Guy Lee's translation itself was lovely and, in my opinion, accessible. I loved his decision to render the dactylic hexameter into the English Alexandrine; it preserved the work's poetic cohesion and replicated as much as possible the original's cadence.)
The other issue for the casual reader is the pervasive repetition. As a Gen-Z American I feel hopelessly far removed from the world Virgil describes and celebrates. Occasionally a topic struck a chord (the then hot-button issue of land confiscation, for example) but, generally, the content felt so alien as to obscure or distract from the enduring human truths to be found in all literature.
If I ever have time to brush up on my Latin, I hope to reread The Eclogues entirely in their native language. No doubt my esteem (and star rating) will be all the greater. But, for now, and in English, a 3.75 will have to suffice.
(NB: Guy Lee's translation itself was lovely and, in my opinion, accessible. I loved his decision to render the dactylic hexameter into the English Alexandrine; it preserved the work's poetic cohesion and replicated as much as possible the original's cadence.)
The other issue for the casual reader is the pervasive repetition. As a Gen-Z American I feel hopelessly far removed from the world Virgil describes and celebrates. Occasionally a topic struck a chord (the then hot-button issue of land confiscation, for example) but, generally, the content felt so alien as to obscure or distract from the enduring human truths to be found in all literature.
If I ever have time to brush up on my Latin, I hope to reread The Eclogues entirely in their native language. No doubt my esteem (and star rating) will be all the greater. But, for now, and in English, a 3.75 will have to suffice.
challenging
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Not me thinking I had like 50% of the book left when in reality I had about 7 pages woop woop. Also get me actually doing the the reading for the Ancient lit module for once who am I?!?- Naomi would be proud EXCEPT OH WAIT SHE CAN'T SEE THIS BECAUSE SHE REFUSES TO LET ME FOLLOW HER.
This is a collection of rustic/pastoral tales so they aren't connected in the sense of the characters but are connected in the sense of the amobean pastoral form i.e a bunch of goats and cheeses and trees. It was a bit confusing having no set connection to all the tales and the people's names aren't exactly memorable so I fully thought it was all one connected story until about half-way through. Take this Mopsus, Meliboeus and Menalcas etc me and my 'M' name would fit right in. Anyway I really liked the whole countryside feel Virgil had going on- he is after all queen of countryside writing, no fighting and farm bees instead; Putin needs to farm some bees the lady doth thinks.
Anyways distraction, Virgil fan-girling over bees doesn't even happen in this book. The ending of the last Eclogue was an absolute bop and kinda (?) sums up all of them- "Get home, my full-fed goats, get home- the Evening star draws on." Mood, I've decided I want to be a goat running around Ancient Roman countryside.
I admit I did have to have up a plot summary thing of all the Eclogues, because otherwise I fully had no clue what was going on. I also don't think the Loeb translation was that accessible but it had the Latin by the side of it which was fun because I could kinda translate some parts of it??? Yay?? Also I cannot lie Virgil is not particularly the most exhilarating Ancient author to read so yeah not the best and a tad repetitive- goats and effectively farmers having our equivalent to rap battles in the countryside do get a bit samey after a while.
This is a collection of rustic/pastoral tales so they aren't connected in the sense of the characters but are connected in the sense of the amobean pastoral form i.e a bunch of goats and cheeses and trees. It was a bit confusing having no set connection to all the tales and the people's names aren't exactly memorable so I fully thought it was all one connected story until about half-way through. Take this Mopsus, Meliboeus and Menalcas etc me and my 'M' name would fit right in. Anyway I really liked the whole countryside feel Virgil had going on- he is after all queen of countryside writing, no fighting and farm bees instead; Putin needs to farm some bees the lady doth thinks.
Anyways distraction, Virgil fan-girling over bees doesn't even happen in this book. The ending of the last Eclogue was an absolute bop and kinda (?) sums up all of them- "Get home, my full-fed goats, get home- the Evening star draws on." Mood, I've decided I want to be a goat running around Ancient Roman countryside.
I admit I did have to have up a plot summary thing of all the Eclogues, because otherwise I fully had no clue what was going on. I also don't think the Loeb translation was that accessible but it had the Latin by the side of it which was fun because I could kinda translate some parts of it??? Yay?? Also I cannot lie Virgil is not particularly the most exhilarating Ancient author to read so yeah not the best and a tad repetitive- goats and effectively farmers having our equivalent to rap battles in the countryside do get a bit samey after a while.
Virgil’s first known collection owes a great deal to Theocritus, whose [b:Idylls|2455|Idylls|Theocritus|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1161044922s/2455.jpg|6444] are some of my favorite poems of the ancient world. In these these ten poems, Virgil merges realism and pastorale fantasy to celebrate song as a kind of catharsis. Virgil was writing in a world in turmoil, and like all great art that emerges from upheaval, The Eclogues both looks to the past and generates new ways of understanding current events through mythic forms. These are poems of longing, loss, and nostalgia that are rooted in the real-world problems of Romans. Many are poems that focus on exile, like Ovid and Horace (whose land was taken by Octavian), but from the perspective of shepherds with neither the influence, wealth, nor connections to recover from their loss. And so they find solace in their songs, which are the lasting, mythic expressions of their otherwise brief, ordinary lives.
Virgil's poetic language is flowing and beautiful, classical and intelligent, sensual, merry, and at times tragic.
The charmingly simple yet powerful themes of these short poems focus on things such as shepherds, singing contests, sexual desire, twins, and soldiers.
The charmingly simple yet powerful themes of these short poems focus on things such as shepherds, singing contests, sexual desire, twins, and soldiers.
The Theocritan idyll, but riven by displacement, dispossession, forgetting. What can singing do against all this loss? Well, it can beguile (a patron, to save your fields and flock; or a lover, to end longing; or a friend, to win companionship or a prized set of drinking cups)—or else conjure up the lost in all its particulars.