Seneca: The Tragedies (Complete Roman Drama in Translation) (Volume 1) [Paperback]

Seneca (Author), David R. Slavitt (Translator)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 080184309X | ISBN-13: 978-0801843099 | Publication Date: April 1, 1992

The volume includes Trojan Women, Thyestes, Phaedra, Medea, and Agamemnon, plus a preface.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Slavitt's ability is clearly in evidence... These translations are rendered in lucid, contemporary English, bringing before us the atrocities, horrors, and grotesqueries of Imperial Rome.

(Classical Outlook )

Slavitt's translation is... lively and sometimes witty.

(Times Literary Supplement )

A good, sensational Senecan read.

(Queen's Quarterly )

The language in these translations [is] as fresh and gleaming as blood just spilled.

(Eleanor Wilner )

About the Author

David R. Slavitt, poet, novelist, critic, and journalist, has published more than fifty books. His translations include the Metamorphoses of Ovid, The Fables of Avianus, the "Eclogues" and "Georgics" of Virgil, and Seneca: The Tragedies, Vols. 1 and 2, all available from Johns Hopkins.

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: The Johns Hopkins University Press (April 1, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 080184309X
• ISBN-13: 978-0801843099
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.8 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #677,916 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Lucius Annaeus Seneca, statesman, philosopher, advocate and man of letters, was born in Spain around 4BC. He rose to prominence at Rome, pursuing a double career in the courts and political life, until Claudius sent him into exile exile on the island of Corsica for eight years. Recalled in AD49, he was appointed tutor to the boy who was to become, in AD54, the emperor Nero. Seneca acted for eight years as Nero's unofficial chief minister until Nero too turned against him and he retired from public life to devote himself to philosophy and writing. In AD65, following the discovery of a plot against the emperor, he and many others were compelled by Nero to commit suicide.