First published just before the end of the Roman Republic by that legendary country's most immortalized leader, "The Conquest of Gaul," also called "Commentarii de Bello Gallico," is an account of Julius Caesar's capture of Gaul in the first century. Beginning with the Helvetian War in 58 BC, Caesar uses his exemplary Latin prose to explain how his forces were protecting Provence, and how they were later drawn out in campaigns against the Veneti,...
"The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault" is a collection of stories by the French author credited with creating the fairy tale genre. After a lengthy career in service to his King, Perrault devoted the rest of his life to writing and in 1697 published "Tales and Stories of the Past with Morals", or "Tales of Mother Goose", which included such iconic tales as "Sleeping Beauty", "Cinderella", "Little Red Riding Hood", "Puss in Boots", and "Bluebeard"....
When Emily Wilson's translation of The Odyssey appeared in 2017--revealing the ancient poem in a contemporary idiom that was "fresh, unpretentious and lean" (Madeline Miller, Washington Post)--critics lauded it as "a revelation" (Susan Chira, New York Times) and "a cultural landmark" (Charlotte Higgins, Guardian) that would forever change how Homer is read in English. Now Wilson has returned with an equally revelatory translation of Homer's other...
A retelling of the medieval poem about a group of travelers on a pilgrimage to Canterbury and the tales they tell each other. With their astonishing diversity of tone and subject matter, The Canterbury Tales have become one of the touchstones of medieval literature. Translated here into modern English, these tales of a motley crowd of pilgrims drawn from all walks of life-from knight to nun, miller to monk-reveal a picture of English life in the fourteenth...
Widely referred to as the "Father of History", Greek Historian Herodotus lived during the 5th century BC and "The Histories" is generally accepted as the first work of historical literature in Western Civilization. Departing from the ancient Homeric tradition of treating historical subjects as epically romantic figures, Herodotus instead approached his subjects with a systematic method of investigation. "The Histories" of Herodotus describe the important...
The Metamorphoses of Ovid is an epic poem comprising over 250 Greek and Roman myths, chronicling the creation of the world to the apotheosis of Julius Caesar. The Metamorphoses is one of the most central texts in Western literature, having influenced authors from Dante to Shakespeare, and inspired acclaimed sculpture and paintings.
Written by Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus in 121 AD while he was the personal secretary to emperor Hadrian, "The Twelve Caesars" is a series of twelve biographies of Roman rulers beginning with Julius Caesar and ending with Domitian. The tales of Rome's emperors are deeply personal and informative, while also entertaining and often filled with drama. Suetonius included invaluable descriptions of the rulers' public and private lives, physical appearances,...
In this comic classic of Russian literature, Chichikov, an amusing and often confused schemer, buys deceased serfs' names from landlords' poll tax lists hoping to mortgage them for profit.
"The son of a pagan father and a Christian mother, Saint Augustine spent his early years torn between conflicting faiths and worldviews. His Confessions, written when he was in his forties, recount how, slowly and painfully, he came to turn away from his youthful ideas and licentious lifestyle, to become instead a staunch advocate of Christianity and one of its most influential thinkers. A remarkably honest and revealing spiritual autobiography, the...
Euripides, along was Sophocles, and Aeschylus, is largely responsible for the rise of Greek tragedy. It was in the 5th Century BC, during the height of Greece's cultural bloom, that Euripides lived and worked. Of his roughly ninety-two plays, only seventeen tragedies survive. Both ridiculed and lauded during his life, Euripides now stands as an innovator of the Greek drama. Collected here are six of Euripides' tragedies in prose translation by Edward...
