Customer Reviews

Seneca: Apocolocyntosis (Cambridge Greek and Latin Classics)

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Seneca's Apocolocyntosis is a quasi-funerary speech given by Seneca on the Saturnalia concerning the (deified) emperor Claudius. The speech is hilarious, mocking a justly deserving tyrant, and is totally worth reading (in Latin it's better than English).

Eden's volume has become the standard critical edition (w/ full apparatus) of Seneca's Apocolocyntosis. Unlike others of the Cambridge texts, this one also includes a full translation in Loeb style with Latin and English on facing pages. If I had a gripe, it's only that the edition is only available in softcover. That's a real shame.

On the one hand, it is important to remember that Seneca wrote this book as a way of stroking the petty ego of Rome's newest emperor, Nero; thus his lampooning of Claudius and fawning admiration of his successor should be taken with a grain of salt. Nevertheless, it is a great Menippean satire - humorous, witty, well-composed, and imaginative. I only wish that the full text remained in our possession; some of it is missing, and I suspect that its absence does detract from the quality of the whole. Oh well.

Commentary is helpful for quick reference a la Cliff's notes and for a decent understanding of the work but too superficial for an in-depth study of the text.