This translation of Virgil’s pastoral poetry is ‘framed by cues for reading aloud’, inspired by the work’s popularity on the bawdy Roman stage. Van Sickle also investigates the collection’s interweaving threads through detailed analyses of its structure and themes.

Many fragments of Greek drama have been rediscovered on papyri, providing tantalizing evidence for lost works by Athens’ great tragedians. This volume’s contributors discuss the interpretation of such fragments and their significance for the study of ancient culture and society.

Jebb’s 1888 Selections, which complemented his magisterial study of five ancient orators, contains both extracts and complete speeches. Including the Greek text and Jebb’s commentary, this reprint also features an introduction to his career and the aims of his edition.

The poem Aetna, ascribed to Virgil in antiquity, incorporates eccentric scientific views on volcanic activity. Ellis’ 1901 edition, comprising text, translation and commentary, is reprinted with Volk’s new introduction to the great Latinist’s work correcting errors in the medieval manuscript. Slightly off-mint.

Written in the 2nd century CE with unique access to the imperial archives, Suetonius’ candid biographies of the first Roman emperors combine accounts of their greatest public achievements with often scandalous details about their private lives and characters.

Following Nero’s suicide Rome entered a period of brutal civil strife. Tacitus’ Histories (here in Church and Brodribb’s classic translation) describes the plots and assassinations of 69 CE, the ‘year of the four emperors’ Galba, Otho, Vitellius and Vespasian.

Set in 13th-century Florence, part autobiography and part religious allegory, Dante's early masterpiece follows his quest to find a poetic idiom worthy of Beatrice, whom he had loved since boyhood. Her early death plunges him into an emotional turmoil that finds relief only through his faith in her continuing spiritual influence. The work is presented here in a verse translation by Anthony Mortimer.

Comprising updated versions of 31 essays published over the past two decades, this volume takes the reader on 'a provocative tour of what is happening now in Classics'. Professor Beard reassesses old answers in scholarly debates concerning Greco-Roman antiquity; offers fresh interpretations of heroes and antiheroes, from the Greek poet Sappho to the emperor Hadrian; explores the evidence for ordinary Romans' worries and ambitions; and asks what our modern responses to the ancient world say about us.

Four tragedies are presented in this modern prose translation – the relatively light Alcestis contrasting with the darker human passions of Medea, The Children of Heracles and Hippolytus. A general introduction and individual prefaces to each play provide context and analysis. (Previously published as Alcestis and Other Plays.)

The tenth book of Ovid’s vast compendium of myth focuses on Orpheus and Eurydice, Venus and Adonis, Myrrha’s incestuous passion for her father and Pygmalion’s love for the statue he created. Ideal for first-time readers of Ovid, this edition contains the Latin text, line-by-line commentary on linguistic and literary matters and a concise introduction addressing the poet’s context and the themes of Book X.

The mythologies of Greece and Rome are full of strange and powerful tales of love and betrayal, war and heroism. These unforgettable stories, whose symbolism still pervades Western culture, are here retold by Jenny March, with translated and quoted passages showing how they were treated in ancient literature and how they have continued to inspire writers up to the present day. This hardback edition is exclusive to Postscript.

Furious that the women of Thebes have flocked to the mountains to worship the newly arrived Dionysus, Pentheus, the Theban king, denounces the god as a charlatan – but no man can deny a god. How Dionysus exacts his terrible revenge, culminating in Pentheus' destruction, is as devastating now as it was in fifth-century Athens. The play is translated and introduced by Robin Robertson.

Part of the Classical Literature and Society series, this study focuses on the role of the poet in the emerging Christian world of the fourth to sixth centuries CE and argues against the traditional view of a 'simple binary opposition' between pagans and Christians. Instead, Shorrock presents the Christian world of late antiquity as imbued with the Classical past, and demonstrates the complex ways in which Classical culture was embraced, integrated, rejected or ignored by poets of the period.

From the birth of the gods to the aftermath of the Trojan War and Plato's myth of Atlantis, Kershaw tells the stories of Greek mythology and discusses the wide-ranging influence of these tales on western culture. The book's final section surveys the ways in which people have tried to understand and rationalize myths, from antiquity to the present.

The female prophets known as sibyls were renowned across the Greco-Roman world and their pronouncements were considered a source of authoritative wisdom. Guillermo focuses on the stories that were told about four prominent sibyls, at Erythrae, Cumae, Delphi and Tibur. He also reflects on the wider cultural associations between women and prophecy and asks how the ancient pagan tradition was later fused with Christianity so successfully that sibyls feature in Michelangelo’s decoration of the Sistine Chapel.

This anthology, which was first published in 1964, is designed as an introduction to a cross-section of poetry, in the original Latin, from the late Republic and early Empire. It presents 36 passages, in different genres and styles, by such authors as Catullus, Virgil and Juvenal. There are short introductions to each extract, detailed notes on language and content and a full vocabulary. Off-mint.

Slightly off-mint. No jacket.

This is Seamus Heaney’s last completed work, an inspired translation of the sixth book of Virgil’s Aeneid in which Aeneas travels through death’s dark door, into the underworld to meet the spirit of his father. The poem is read here by Ian McKellen.

Voltaire’s ‘philosophical story’ Micromegas foreshadows science fiction, telling of a 650-year-old giant from Sirius who visits Earth and encounters the stupidity of the human race. This classic Enlightenment text is accompanied by a further 13 short tales, all newly translated.

The first prose history in European civilization, Herodotus’ great work traces the growth of the Persian Empire and its great conflict with the Greeks, up to the defeat of Xerxes in 480–79 BCE. Read by David Timson. Unabridged.

Assuming no prior knowledge of Roman poetry, John Godwin presents a general introduction to Catullus, quoting liberally from the poems in both Latin and translation as he deals with the poet’s innovations, technique and topics, and discusses Catullus’ love poetry, obscenity and humour in the context of contemporary Roman manners. No jacket.

In the final years of the Trojan War, the Achaeans, led by Agamemnon and joined eventually by a reluctant Achilles, are fighting to reclaim Helen from Hector of Troy. This great epic is presented in Samuel Butler’s 1898 prose translation, with black and white illustrations based on Greek vase painting. Slip-cased.

In the aftermath of the Trojan War, Odysseus makes his ten-year journey from Troy to Ithaca, overcoming the Cyclops, the Sirens and the Shades of the Dead, only to meet suitors vying for his wife's hand at home in Ithaca. This edition presents Alexander Pope’s classic translation, with illustrations after John Flaxman. Slip-cased.

Jason’s quest for the golden fleece, Echo’s doomed love for Narcissus and the visits to Hades by Ulysses and Aeneas are among the 49 Greco-Roman myths retold here by expert storytellers of the 19th and early 20th century. Inspired by the versions of ancient authors, they recreate an age when mortal heroes mixed with vengeful gods and faced such dangerous creatures as the Sirens and the Minotaur.

Addled by morphine, the dying Sigmund Freud is visited by the blind prophet Tiresias at his London home. Their conversation revisits the myth of Oedipus, leading the father of psychoanalysis to re-examine the foundations of his life’s work.

Anne Brontë’s 1848 novel tells of a widow who arrives at an old manor house with her young son to pursue a career as an artist – an unconventional choice that soon gives rise to gossip.

‘Little Red Riding Hood’, ‘Snow White’, ‘The Goose-Girl’ – many of the best-loved fairytales were collected and recorded by the German Grimm brothers in the 19th century. More than 60 tales are presented here in their original, often sinister versions.

Petronius’ debauched, yet exhilarating adventure dates back to the first century CE and the reign of Nero. It follows the exploits of Encolpius, an impoverished gladiator and his boy-lover Giton, and their encounters with a host of lewd and comical rogues. Read by Jonathan Keeble. Unabridged.

This collection of writings by René Descartes (1596–1650) begins with the short, yet tremendously important Discourse on the Method, with the famous assertion cogito ergo sum within the discussion of knowledge, the existence of God and the distinction between mind and body. The Meditations then expand on Descartes’ metaphysical arguments, and selections from The Principles of Philosophy complete the volume.

The story of a group of boys marooned on a tropical island after a plane crash, Lord of the Flies, the first novel by William Golding (1911–1993), was published in 1954 and is now a modern classic. For all its adventure and excitement, the book is a profound exploration of the human potential for evil: at first, the boys elect leaders and organize themselves, but very soon rivalry, fear and violence erupt and a descent into savagery begins.

The once-prosperous land of the Danes stands in ruins, its people terrified and its king almost defeated by a violent and hideous monster. In desperation, he sends for the noble fighter Beowulf – their last hope.

Imprisoned for ‘gross indecency’ in 1895, Oscar Wilde wrote this long, impassioned letter to his estranged lover, Lord Alfred Douglas. Describing the joy and despair of love, it also reveals his views on art, Christianity and incarceration.