The Cambridge Companion to Virgil

The poet Virgil remains the most significant and influential figure in Latin literature, and this expanded and updated Companion covers his life, work, and reception from antiquity to the present. The Aeneid, the Eclogues, the Georgics, and the Appendix Vergiliana are all discussed, as are art, history, politics, and philosophy; Virgil's literary style is carefully explored along with poetic traditions before and since, and chapters engage with his poems and their reception from perspectives including intertextuality, narratology, gender theory, philology and historicism. Leading authors cover topics from translations and commentaries to genre, authority, and characterisation, providing revised and updated recommendations for further reading. This volume is an accessible introduction to Virgil and his legacy for students and teachers, while also providing wide-ranging and in-depth investigations that will appeal to scholars of classical literature and other disciplines.

1. Introduction: 'the classic of all Europe' Charles Martindale; Part I. Receptions: 2. Modern receptions and their interpretative implications: the case of T. S. Eliot Duncan F. Kennedy; 3. Aspects of Virgil's reception in antiquity Richard Tarrant; 4. The Appendix Vergiliana Scott McGill; 5. Augustine's Virgil Gillian Clark; 6a. The Virgil commentary of Servius Don Fowler (revised by Sergio Casali and Fabio Stok); 6b. Postclassical commentary Sergio Casali and Fabio Stok; 7. Virgil in English translation Colin Burrow; 8. Virgils from Dante to Milton Colin Burrow; 9. Virgil in art L. B. T. Houghton; Part II. Forms: 10. Green politics: the Eclogues Charles Martindale; 11. Virgilian didaxis: value and meaning in the Georgics William W. Batstone; 12. Virgilian epic Duncan F. Kennedy; 13. Closure and the Book of Virgil Elena Theodorakopoulos; Part III. Contexts: 14. Poetry and power: Virgil's poetry in a contemporary context Richard Tarrant; 15. Rome and its traditions James E. G. Zetzel; 16. Virgil and the cosmos: religious and philosophical ideas Susanna Braund; 17. Virgil's intertextual personae Joseph Farrell; 18. Virgil and tragedy Philip Hardie; Part IV. Themes: 19. Virgil as a poet Victoria Moul; 20. Virgil's style James J. O'Hara; 21. Character in Virgil Helen Lovatt; 22a. Virgilian narrative: storytelling Don Fowler (revised by Alessandro Barchiesi); 22b. Virgilian narrative: ecphrasis Alessandro Barchiesi; 23. Sons and lovers: sexuality and gender in Virgil's poetry Ellen Oliensis; 24. Authority Fiachra Mac Góráin; Envois: 25. The death of Virgil Fiona Cox; 26. Virgil: the future? Fiachra Mac Góráin; Dateline compiled by Genevieve Liveley.

Charles Martindale is Emeritus Professor of Latin at the University of Bristol. His work focuses on Latin poetry (including Virgil), reception studies, English/Classics relationships, and aesthetics, and he has published five authored or co-authored books and twelve edited or co-edited volumes, among them the 5-volume Oxford History of Classical Reception in English Literature. A special issue of Classical Receptions Journal was devoted to his pioneering work Redeeming the Text (1993).
Fiachra Mac Góráin is Associate Professor of Classics at University College London. He has published extensively on Virgil and his reception and is regularly invited to speak about him in various countries around the world. He has also engaged in consultancy work for the BBC.