The Georgics of Virgil: Bilingual Edition (Paperback)

~ (Translator)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Ravishing . . . always euphonious, often singable, and sometimes magnificent—-truly worthy of the best poet’s best poem." -- The New York Sun

"This is the best poetry of Ancient Rome, rendered by the best translator of modern America." -- Poetry --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"David Ferry's translation of the enchanting Georgics is for poetry lovers like a drink of water from a country spring on a summer day. It's refreshing, invigorating, almost intoxicating in the pleasure of discovery it offers." --Anthony Day, Los Angeles Times

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Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux; 1st edition (May 2, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374530319
• ISBN-13: 978-0374530310
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.4 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #470,513 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

25 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Essential Poem and a Beautiful Translation, February 2, 2007

By	Brickbat70 (Missouri, USA) - See all my reviews

I should start by admitting that I'm completely unqualified to judge the accuracy of this translation. My high school Latin has twenty years of rust on it, and it was never good enough to pass judgment on another's translation. All I can do is (1) judge Ferry's translation as poetry, and (2) assume that it is faithful to Virgil and judge Virgil based on what I read in this translation.

This is an absolutely beautiful set of poems that is essential reading to any student of European literature. On the surface, it sounds painfully boring. Virgil writes of bees and crops and trees and how to mate a bull. 50% of the poem involves direct instruction in how to best accomplish these tasks. However, he somehow manages to make it all beautiful and fascinating and profoundly human.

Two themes account for its beauty. One is the understanding that animals and plants live and die in a way that might not be human yet is still noble. Virgil cares for his subjects--whether it's a bee having its wings clipped or a formerly great stallion suffering the indignities of old age. The other is a wide-eyed awe for everything in life--the average human's monotonous work mixed with a few moments of bliss, the random destructiveness of nature, and the beauty that surrounds every moment.

As a lover of literature, I'm surprised by how much later poetry I quickly detected in these poems. They clearly influenced much later literature (e.g., Wordsworth). As a human, I'm surprised by how certain I am that I will return to these poems throughout the remainder of my life. They contain such an abundance of energy and joy that I'm still trying to decipher exactly how Virgil managed it.

This isn't the best review I've ever written, but it fails for the right reasons--because of the awe I have for these poems. I'm a 36-year old high school English teacher stunned that I'm still discovering words of such shocking beauty.

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a translation that is as new and refreshing as the original, August 21, 2007

By	J. Adams "History buff" (Washington, DC USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

While it has been many years since i studied Latin in school I think that Ferry's translation may actually be better than the original when it comes to describing the true beauty of nature.
Having read just about every other treatment of this classic such as Wilkinson, Day, and even Greenough, I think that Ferry has done a masterful job of showing the true mystery and beauty of life as lived and witnessed by humans in going about the business of living amongst all of God's other creatures.
This book is true poetry, and shows what has been lost with the end of study of the classics in the swamp of modern education today as political correctness displaced masterpieces like this in the name of getting rid of "dead European males" on most campuses all over the world.
This is a wonderful book by a master of understanding how to convert a phenomenal poem written 2000 years ago in a very old language and make it live and breathe as if it were fresh born.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars an esteemed translation, February 19, 2009

By	Poetry Reader "Brad" (Madison, Wisconsin USA) - See all my reviews

David Ferry is one of, if not the best translators of ancient texts we have in America. His erudition and keen ear (and this is a difficult text to translate) open up the Georgics is such a way as to make them both complex and accessible at once.