Literary Criticism - Ancient and Classical

Ancient Greece was rich with stories of queer love and genderfluid identity--but what can these ancient stories tell us about our contemporary world?Tales as old as antiquity--whether the love affair of Achilles and Patroclus, the genderfluid Tiresias, or the infamous Heracles--are still capturing our...

A New York Times/PBS NewsHour Book Club Pick From award-winning memoirist and critic, and bestselling author of The Lost: a deeply moving tale of a father and son's transformative journey in reading--and reliving--Homer's epic masterpiece. When eighty-one-year-old Jay Mendelsohn decides to enroll in the...

Based on the conviction that only translators who write poetry themselves can properly recreate the celebrated and timeless tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, the Greek Tragedy in New Translations series offers new translations that go beyond the literal meaning of the Greek in...

A stand-alone edition of Sophocles's Antigone taken from Chicago's renowned translations of the Greek tragedies. Drawn from the authoritative third edition of the University of Chicago Press's Complete Greek Tragedies series, this stand-alone edition of Elizabeth Wyckoff's elegant rendition of Antigone reminds readers why...

The trial of Socrates is one of the most famous of history. He was adjudged to be guilty, and sentenced to death. Though he could easily have escaped from Athens with the help of friends eager to help, he explains in The Crito that...

Beyond the desolate moors and marshes is Hrothgar's lighted hall, holding out against the encroaching dark. A mead-hall revered by all Norsemen, until one night Grendel, the fen-demon, bursts through the door.Beowulf is an epic Anglo-Saxon poem which is both subtle and savage. For...

A new biography of Cicero, one of the most influential and fascinating figures in classical history.When the Roman statesman Cicero was murdered in 43 BCE, his head was cut off, and his tongue pierced with pins - a final, brutal act of revenge against...

Building on the best-selling tradition of previous editions, Classical Mythology, Twelfth Edition, is the most comprehensive survey of classical mythology available--and the first full-color textbook of its kind. Featuring the authors' clear and extensive translations of original sources, it brings to life the myths...

A preeminent Renaissance philosopher on the founder of Neoplatonism Marsilio Ficino (1433-1499) was the leading Platonic philosopher of the Renaissance and is generally recognized as the greatest authority on ancient Platonism before modern times. Among his greatest accomplishments as a scholar was his 1492...

Trebia. Trasimene. Cannae. With three stunning victories, Hannibal humbled Rome and nearly shattered its empire. Even today Hannibal's brilliant, if ultimately unsuccessful, campaign against Rome during the Second Punic War (218-202 BC) make him one of history's most celebrated military leaders. This biography by...

In this sharp and often entertaining tour through antiquity, Emily Wilson--whose renditions of Homer's Odyssey and Iliad have captured a generation's imagination--explores the complicated terrain of reading and writing about the ancient past. Drawing on twenty years of scholarship and teaching, Wilson explores the...

Alain de Botton's bestselling The Consolations of Philosophy--later made into a six-part TV series--has helped popularize ancient philosophy and especially the work of Seneca. This superb volume offers the finest translation of Seneca's dialogues and essays in print, capturing the full range of his...

An urgent study of Homer's Iliad, exposing the beginnings of the ecological disaster we now face and facilitating our understanding of its history "Exhilarating."--Emma Greensmith, Times Literary Supplement The roots of today's environmental catastrophe run deep into humanity's past. Through this unprecedented reading of...

Selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best nonfiction books of all timeA book about romantic love, Eros the Bittersweet is Anne Carson's exploration of the concept of "eros" in both classical philosophy and literature. Beginning with, "It was Sappho who...

Named one of the 100 best nonfiction books of all time by the Modern Library Anne Carson's remarkable first book about the paradoxical nature of romantic love Since it was first published, Eros the Bittersweet, Anne Carson's lyrical meditation on love in ancient Greek...

Socrates against sophistry. Plato of Athens, who laid the foundations of the Western philosophical tradition and in range and depth ranks among its greatest practitioners, was born to a prosperous and politically active family circa 427 BC. In early life an admirer of Socrates,...

Widely adopted for classroom use, this book offers translations of four major works of ancient Greek literature which treat the life and thought of Socrates, focusing particularly on his trial and defense (three dialogues by Plato: Euthyphro, Apology of Socrates, and Crito) and on...

Originating nearly four thousand years ago in ancient Mesopotamia, the epic of Gilgameshtells the story of a tyrannical king and his wild counterpart, Enkidu, spawned by the gods to rein in the king's cruel tendencies. They face off in a violent wrestling match, but...

"Plato is philosophy, and philosophy, Plato."--Emerson The Republic and other great dialogues by the immortal Greek philosopher Plato are masterpieces that form part of the most important single body of writing in the history of philosophy. Beauty, love, immortality, knowledge, and justice are discussed...

The Hermetica are a body of mystical texts written in late antiquity, but believed during the Renaissance (when they became well known) to be much older. Their supposed author, a mythical figure named Hermes Trismegistus, was thought to be a contemporary of Moses. The...