LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Catullus: Poetry
built 202 days ago
Poetry is notoriously difficult to translate; of poetry, Latin poetry is particularly difficult; and of Latin poetry, Catullus is among the most resistant to translation. One is inclined to agree, with Robert Frost, that poetry is precisely that aspect of literature which cannot be translated from one language to another.
Source:
Catullus wrote elegant lyric poetry and scurrilous invective. Among his targets was Julius Caesar. Catullus was in love with a woman he called Lesbia who is believed to have been Clodia, the sister of Clodius Pulcher.
Source:
Catullus wrote in many different meters including hendecasyllabic and elegiac couplets (common in love poetry). All of his poetry shows strong and occasionally wild emotions especially in regard to Lesbia. He ... demonstrates a great sense of humour such as in Catullus 13.
Source:
"Green is a celebrated classicist and his boyish enthusiasm is a perfect match for the bawdy ferocity of Catullus. . . . He perfectly captures Catullus' voice-whose outrageousness may shock even the most jaded sophisticate. You don't have to be a regular reader of poetry to like these poems."--Meghan O'Rourke, Slate Magazine
Source:
It is not unfitting... that Catulus should be associated with Catullus since, besides sharing similar names, both were Romans with interests in Greek culture and poetry. Catulus, who wrote Latin love epigrams in the Alexandrian vein (of which only two survive), can be seen as an early pioneer in the sort of poetry that Catullus later brought to sublime perfection.
Source:
This volume completes the edition of all the surviving poetry of Catullus, aiming to bring the literary history of this poet to readers who may not have read his work before. It aims to describe and discuss recent scholarship on the poems, seeing them in their context and intertext as fully as possible.
Source:
MORE ABOUT
Poetry