PREFACE AND
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

As in other books in the Ancient Wisdom for Modern Readers series, the original Latin is included in addition to the translation. Unlike in most other books in the series, however, it is not on facing pages but forms part of the main text. It can be skipped by those who don’t read Latin.

My warm thanks go to Al Bertrand at PUP who started this project rolling, Hannah Paul who commissioned it, and Rob Tempio who saw it to completion. I am most grateful to them for an opportunity to bring a great poet to a wider audience.

I am especially grateful to my friend Maureen Almond, who has read and commented on the whole volume with the eye of a poet and fellow Horatian enthusiast, and to the two anonymous reviewers for PUP, who made salutary suggestions. I would also like to thank Jenny Wolkowicki and Maia Vaswani at PUP for their help in the final stages.

While this book was in press, two of my early teachers and advisers died; my former tutor Jasper Griffin and my post-doctoral mentor Donald Russell, both of whom wrote illuminatingly about Horace and had his generosity of spirit; I dedicate this volume jointly to their memory.