This is the preface of Joseph Trapp's translation of Virgil's Aeneis into blank verse, which was published in three volumes in 1731 and 1735. Trapp's preface to his version of the Aeneid is significant because it merges the Miltonic example with neoclassical principles to understand the Latin text logically and to communicate the incredibly compelling and moving experience that the Aeneid produces.
'If a man is to write A Panegyrick, he may keep vices out of sight; but if he professes to write A Life, he must represent it really as it was.' In the last of his major writings, Samuel Johnson looked back over the previous two centuries of English Literature in order to describe the personalities as well as the achievements of the leading English poets. The major Lives - of Milton, Dryden, Swift, and Pope - are memorable cameos of the life of writing in which Johnson is as attentive to human frailty as to literary prowess. The shorter Lives preserve some of Johnson's most piercing, critical judgements. Unsentimental, opinionated, and quotable, The Lives of the Poets continues to influence the reputations of the writers concerned. It is one of the greatest works of English criticism, but also one of the most humanly diverting. This selection of the Lives of ten of the most important poets draws its text from Roger Lonsdale's authoritative complete edition. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.
"Lectures on Poetry: Read in the Schools of Natural Philosophy at Oxford" by Joseph Trapp refer to the author's work on the epics of Virgil. In these lecture, he aimed to educate his audiences, both in person and on paper, as to the art of poetry. From how it began to comparing it with more visual mediums. the book is still a useful tool for literary students, aspiring poets, and those curious to learn about this genre.
This study reclaims Pope's meaning in each successive imitation by focusing on the differences between Horace's Latin poems and Pope's English versions. It considers not only Pope's expression of concerns about his own world but also the contemporary reputation of the Roman Augustan Age and of Augustus and Horace.
Virgil became a school author in his own lifetime and the centre of the Western canon for the next 1800 years, exerting a major influence on European literature, art, and politics. This Companion is designed as an indispensable guide for anyone seeking a fuller understanding of an author critical to so many disciplines. It consists of essays by seventeen scholars from Britain, the USA, Ireland and Italy which offer a range of different perspectives both traditional and innovative on Virgil's works, and a renewed sense of why Virgil matters today. The Companion is divided into four main sections, focussing on reception, genre, context, and form. This ground-breaking book not only provides a wealth of material for an informed reading but also offers sophisticated insights which point to the shape of Virgilian scholarship and criticism to come.
This study traces the steady decline of classical authority in English literature from the mid-seventeenth century and the role of translation in shifting the emphasis away the classical learning. The author focuses on Virgil, once the most revered of poets but also explores the fate of some of his fellow Ancients.
Transforming academic and popular understanding of this pivotal but, until now, largely under-researched literary figure, this volume offers the first full and consistent edition of Allan Ramsay's prose. The volume contains all extant prose writings, from both manuscript and print sources. As well as all known letters, the volume includes prefaces, dedications and advertisements for Ramsay's major collections. It also contains Ramsay's anonymously-published Some Few Hints in Defence of Dramatical Entertainments, the full text of his influential collection of Scots Proverbs and significant prose from manuscript sources, including Ramsay's account of Edinburgh's Porteous Riots in April 1736 and notes on contemporary plays. In these works, we see Ramsay's consistent and steadfast commitment to preserving Scottish literary culture, and gain a privileged insight into Ramsay's personality, his priorities, ambitions and core beliefs.
