Horace
Poet on a Volcano
Published on 13. May 2025
Book
Hardback
328 pages
978-0-300-25658-1 (ISBN)
Description
A biography of Horace, one of the most popular poets from antiquity, revealing the little-known man behind his famous lines
"Peter Stothard is a master of modern writing about ancient Rome, of vividly bringing to life its poetry and its poets."-Mary Beard
Quintus Horatius Flaccus (65-8 BCE) wrote some of ancient Rome's greatest poetry, melding languages and cultures with youthful ideals and a realist's recognition of the dictatorial world around him. Horace is famed for his fine phrases, lyric sex, and guidance on how to live, but he was a poet maddened by war, and many of his most self-revealing poems have rarely been read. He could be sublime and obscene, amusing and abusive, a model of moderation and anything but.
In this book, the first modern retelling of Horace's life, Peter Stothard follows the poet from his birth as the son of a formerly enslaved father through his rise to the highest circles of Roman society. He shines a light on how shattering experiences in the war to save Rome's republic shaped the loyal servant and revolutionary artist he became. With astute scholarship and sympathy, Stothard follows Horace's rise from humble beginnings to the social and political heights of the autocracy he had fought to prevent.
"Peter Stothard is a master of modern writing about ancient Rome, of vividly bringing to life its poetry and its poets."-Mary Beard
Quintus Horatius Flaccus (65-8 BCE) wrote some of ancient Rome's greatest poetry, melding languages and cultures with youthful ideals and a realist's recognition of the dictatorial world around him. Horace is famed for his fine phrases, lyric sex, and guidance on how to live, but he was a poet maddened by war, and many of his most self-revealing poems have rarely been read. He could be sublime and obscene, amusing and abusive, a model of moderation and anything but.
In this book, the first modern retelling of Horace's life, Peter Stothard follows the poet from his birth as the son of a formerly enslaved father through his rise to the highest circles of Roman society. He shines a light on how shattering experiences in the war to save Rome's republic shaped the loyal servant and revolutionary artist he became. With astute scholarship and sympathy, Stothard follows Horace's rise from humble beginnings to the social and political heights of the autocracy he had fought to prevent.
Reviews / Votes
"[A] gory, gripping story of an ex-slave's son who became a war poet in the twilight of the Roman Republic and a courtier in the empire of Augustus."-Dominic Green, Wall Street Journal"Stothard knows his source material backwards-and has fun with it."-Rachel Cunliffe, Times (UK)
"Vibrant and enthralling . . . [and] relevant today. . . . A compelling portrait of a man and his times that will entrance."-Jim Kelly, Air Mail
"Vivid, informative and probing."-William Fitzgerald, Times Literary Supplement
"[Stothard's] books are so intensely enjoyable, so invigoratingly smart. . . . So it is with this new book. . . . [A] remarkably energetic work, with two standout bits of excellence. The first of these is Stothard's running commentary on the poems themselves, which tends to make Horace's artistic development as gripping as if readers were watching it happen in real time. . . . And the second bit of excellence: 30 pages of close-typed Source Notes that veritably sing with erudition and zest."-Steve Donoghue, Open Letters Review
"Beautifully-written. . . . Stothard writes so compellingly that you feel you are never more than a few feet away from the poet in all his lardy splendour."-Daisy Dunn, Spectator
"Stothard has written a splendid and fascinating book that will surely have us rereading it time and again. No body interested in late republican and early imperial Rome should miss it."-Allan Massie, Literary Review
"A pert, canny, and enchanting biography."-New Criterion
"In an always lucid, evenly flowing prose, Stothard sets out Horace's family background, corrects mistaken notions about him, and connects his life and career to the major events and players of his day. . . . [Horace] was in his poetry able to establish a winning intimacy between himself and his readers that traveled down through the centuries."-Joseph Epstein, National Review
"[Stothard] manages with fine economy and immensely readable sentences to integrate life and times (and what times) in a most compelling narrative."-Cultag Press Blog
"The author brings the classical world to life vividly and with wit, stretching out a scholarly hand to those with little knowledge of antiquity."-Matthew D'Ancona, New European
"[Stothard] writes with novelistic flair. . . . Substantial and well researched."-Harry Eyres, The Tablet
"A fascinating account and a story told well."-Glynn Young, Tweetspeak
"Peter Stothard is a master of modern writing about ancient Rome, of vividly bringing to life its poetry and its poets."-Mary Beard
"A fascinating biography of an extraordinary life. Sexual abuse and the madness of war beyond the better-known moral lectures, wine, and rose petals. A brilliant and compelling study that brings Horace to life for a new generation."-Simon Sebag Montefiore, author of The World: A Family History of Humanity
"In this lively biography of Horace and his times, Stothard shows how a poet is not only born, but made. From humble beginnings (the son of a slave), through education, application, and luck, even after finding himself on the losing side of a civil war, Horace finds himself rubbing shoulders with Rome's elite. Stothard wears his considerable learning with gossamer lightness, keeping a weather eye on the poems (there is something here for the Latinist as well as the layman) even as he tells Horace's story. Coming of age in an uncertain era of strong men jostling for dominance, as dreams of restoring the Republic faded and the world order was upended, Horace is a poet not only for all time, but for our times. Should poets be speaking truth, albeit slant, to autocratic power, or distract themselves with love, friendship and song? In Horace's modern poems, technical feats of meter and mosaics of word order, he shows the way of the Roman road, 'straight where it can be, sinuous where it has to be.' No one knows what's coming. Seize the moment."-A. E. Stallings, author of Frieze Frame "[A] gory, gripping story of an ex-slave's son who became a war poet in the twilight of the Roman Republic and a courtier in the empire of Augustus."-Dominic Green, Wall Street Journal
"Stothard knows his source material backwards-and has fun with it."-Rachel Cunliffe, Times (UK)
"Vibrant and enthralling . . . [and] relevant today. . . . A compelling portrait of a man and his times that will entrance."-Jim Kelly, Air Mail
"Vivid, informative and probing."-William Fitzgerald, Times Literary Supplement
"[Stothard's] books are so intensely enjoyable, so invigoratingly smart. . . . So it is with this new book. . . . [A] remarkably energetic work, with two standout bits of excellence. The first of these is Stothard's running commentary on the poems themselves, which tends to make Horace's artistic development as gripping as if readers were watching it happen in real time. . . . And the second bit of excellence: 30 pages of close-typed Source Notes that veritably sing with erudition and zest."-Steve Donoghue, Open Letters Review
"Beautifully-written. . . . Stothard writes so compellingly that you feel you are never more than a few feet away from the poet in all his lardy splendour."-Daisy Dunn, Spectator
"Stothard has written a splendid and fascinating book that will surely have us rereading it time and again. No body interested in late republican and early imperial Rome should miss it."-Allan Massie, Literary Review
"A pert, canny, and enchanting biography."-New Criterion
"In an always lucid, evenly flowing prose, Stothard sets out Horace's family background, corrects mistaken notions about him, and connects his life and career to the major events and players of his day. . . . [Horace] was in his poetry able to establish a winning intimacy between himself and his readers that traveled down through the centuries."-Joseph Epstein, National Review
"[Stothard] manages with fine economy and immensely readable sentences to integrate life and times (and what times) in a most compelling narrative."-Cultag Press Blog
"The author brings the classical world to life vividly and with wit, stretching out a scholarly hand to those with little knowledge of antiquity."-Matthew D'Ancona, New European
"[Stothard] writes with novelistic flair. . . . Substantial and well researched."-Harry Eyres, The Tablet
"A fascinating account and a story told well."-Glynn Young, Tweetspeak
"Peter Stothard is a master of modern writing about ancient Rome, of vividly bringing to life its poetry and its poets."-Mary Beard
"A fascinating biography of an extraordinary life. Sexual abuse and the madness of war beyond the better-known moral lectures, wine, and rose petals. A brilliant and compelling study that brings Horace to life for a new generation."-Simon Sebag Montefiore, author of The World: A Family History of Humanity
"In this lively biography of Horace and his times, Stothard shows how a poet is not only born, but made. From humble beginnings (the son of a slave), through education, application, and luck, even after finding himself on the losing side of a civil war, Horace finds himself rubbing shoulders with Rome's elite. Stothard wears his considerable learning with gossamer lightness, keeping a weather eye on the poems (there is something here for the Latinist as well as the layman) even as he tells Horace's story. Coming of age in an uncertain era of strong men jostling for dominance, as dreams of restoring the Republic faded and the world order was upended, Horace is a poet not only for all time, but for our times. Should poets be speaking truth, albeit slant, to autocratic power, or distract themselves with love, friendship and song? In Horace's modern poems, technical feats of meter and mosaics of word order, he shows the way of the Roman road, 'straight where it can be, sinuous where it has to be.' No one knows what's coming. Seize the moment."-A. E. Stallings, author of Frieze Frame
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
United States
Target group
College/higher education
Product notice
Cloth over boards
Illustrations
1 b-w illus.
Dimensions
Height: 220 mm
Width: 141 mm
Thickness: 32 mm
Weight
452 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-300-25658-1 (9780300256581)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Peter Stothard is a classicist, journalist, and critic. He is a former editor of The Times of London and of the Times Literary Supplement. His books include The Last Assassin: The Hunt for the Killers of Julius Caesar; Crassus: The First Tycoon; and Palatine: An Alternative History of the Caesars.