by Philip Hooker
Once
again, I have surveyed The Bookseller’s Buyers’ Guides, looking for forthcoming
(or recent) books on classical themes which publishers believe will be of
interest to the general reader. There
are not so many this time, so I have again called in a number from
elsewhere. And indicated publication
dates may not be currently reliable. Paul Cartledge’s book on Thebes, due in
May, widely and favourably reviewed, is not, in fact, emerging as a hardback
until November; at this stage we just have the e-book.
I
start with two outstanding books from leading scholars. Roy Gibson’s Man of High Empire, the Life of Pliny the Younger,
was very highly praised by Rebecca Langlands: “A wise and humane biography,
finely crafted....Gibson writes beautifully, with gentle wit, and his insights
are so grounded in vivid landscapes as to linger in the mind long after the
book has been laid aside”. Edith Hall
and Henry Stead have produced A
People’s History of Classics: Class and Greco-Roman Antiquity in Britain and
Ireland 1689 to 1939 – the influence of the subject on ordinary working
people. It tells of Chartist Banners, Staffordshire pots, Dissenting schools,
autodidacts, Robert Tressell’s debt to Plato, the work of Christopher Caudwell
and Jack Lindsay and much more. The Morning Star’s reviewer called it a
riveting and entertaining read, “a classic in every sense of the word”. David
Butterfield, in History Today, was less impressed; he noted the almost
complete lack of coverage of the role of grammar schools and the likes of
Richard Porson; its “rich and varied pickings have much to teach and inspire”,
but it does lack balance.
There
are two notable books which are likely to feature at literary festivals. Peter Stothard offers The Last
Assassin: The Hunt for the Killers of Julius Caesar. Octavian tracked them
all down, but Cassius Parmensis, poet and sailor, evaded his agents for 14
years. “A political thriller and a human story that astonishes” declares Hilary
Mantel. Natalie Haynes has Pandora’s
Jar: Women in the Greek Myths (“Box”, we are told, was a 16th
century mistranslation of pithos by Erasmus).
Popular
fiction includes the latest works from Harry
Sidebottom, Simon Scarrow, Conn Iggulden, Robert Fabbri, Simon Turney, Antony
Riches and Christian Cameron. These
continue to sell very well. The most imaginative work is probably Philip Womack’s The Arrow of Apollo,
a fresh interpretation of Greek Myth for young adults, set in Achaea and
Mycenae 15 years after the Trojan War.
We
also note a number of non-fiction works by what might be called professional
authors (rather than academics). These include Adrian Goldsworthy’s Philip and Alexander: Kings and Conquerors,
a double biography based in Macedon, Guy
de la Bédoyère’s Gladius: Living, Fighting and Dying in the Roman Army,
and Emma Southon’s A Fatal Thing
Happened on the Way to the Forum: Murder in Ancient Rome.
Broadening our scope, we have Robin Lane Fox with The Invention of Medicine: from Homer to Hippocrates (whose Books 3 and 5 may belong to a much earlier era than generally recognised), Benjamin Wardhaugh’s The Book of Wonders: How Euclid’s Elements Built The World – influencing 2,000 years of art, philosophy and literature, and Pauline Allen and Bronwen Nash with Greek and Latin Letters in Late Antiquity: The Christianisation of a Literary Form.
Less
literary works include Susan Woodford’s
Greek and Roman Art in the Art Essentials series and a new series of
multimedia Apple e-books on ancient theatre for the 21st century
edited by Fiona McIntosh and team,
currently the Agamemnon (in instalments), previously Medea, based
on APGRD’s collected materials. Naxos’ latest classical audiobook is Tacitus, read by David Timson – and Julian Morgan has published Quare id
Faciam: The Latin Puzzle Book – 100 word games, all in Latin, “definitely
not a book for Latin beginners”.
New
translations include Virgil’s Aeneid
by Shadi Bartsch and a continuing series from Princeton with jolly titles – How
to Be Content: An Ancient Poet’s Guide for an Age of Excess is Horace translated by Stephen Harrison; How
to Give: An Ancient Guide to Giving and Receiving is Seneca translated by James Romm and How to Drink: A Classical
Guide to the Art of Imbibing is Vincent
Obsopoeus translated by Michael Fontaine. New texts and commentaries
include Juvenal: Satires Book V
edited by John Godwin, Sophocles: Oedipus
Tyrannus edited by Jenny March and (in the CUP Green and Yellow series) Plautus: Pseudolus edited by David
Christenson.
Philip Hooker is the Hon. Treasurer of the Classical Association, and writes regularly for the CA Blog on Classics in the Media
