Fighting for Rome
Poets and Caesars, History and Civil War

An examination of the disjunction between the militaristic culture of classical Rome, and the domination of its history by civil war.

John Henderson (Author)

9780521580267, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 12 March 1998

360 pages
23.6 x 15.9 x 2.5 cm, 0.615 kg

"...the patient reader (even if his or her patience is often tried) will find consistent nuggets of gold. It's what makes Henderson worth reading: it's part of his (c)harm." Classical World

The essays in Fighting for Rome confront the traumatic disjunction between the militarist culture of classical Rome, with its heavy investment in valour, conquest and triumph, and the domination of its history by civil war, where Roman soldiers killed so many Romans for control of Rome. The essays gathered and rewritten here range across the literary forms (history, satire, lyric and epic) and work closely with the ancient texts (Appian and Julius Caesar; Horace; Lucan and Statius; Tacitus and Livy). Close reading and powerful translation communicate the ancient writers' efforts to grasp and respond to the Roman civil wars, and to their product, Roman terror under the Caesars. The book aims to bring to life strong reactions to a world order run by civil war.

Preface
Introduction
Part I. Histories of the Civil Wars: 1. Three men in a vote: proscription (Appian, Civil wars 4.1–6)
2. XPDNC: writing Caesar (On the civil war)
Part II. Horace: 3. On getting rid of kings: Horace, Satires 1.7
4. Polishing off the politics: Horace's Ode to Pollio (Odes 2.1)
Part III. Epic: 5. Lucan: the word at war
6. Statius' Thebaid: form (p)remade
Part IV. Histories of Rome: 7. Tacitus: the world in pieces
8. Livy and the invention of history
Date chart
Bibliography
Indexes.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: classical, early & medieval [DSBB]