Horace

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Horace

For other people named Horace, see Horace (disambiguation). Quintus Horatius Flaccus, (December 8, 65 BC - November 27, 8 BC), known in the English-speaking world as Horace, was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus.

Life

Born at Venosa or Vunesia as it was called in his day near (Lucania), Horace was the son of a freedman, but he himself was born free. His father, though poor, spent considerable money on Horace's education, accompanying him first to Rome for his primary education, and then to Athens to study Greek and philosophy. Horace never took his father's care and sacrifice for granted; his relationship with his father remains one of the most endearing personal episodes to survive from the classical period. In his own words (note that some of the beauty is lost in translation):

If my character is flawed by a few minor faults, but is otherwise decent and moral, if you can point out only a few scattered blemishes on an otherwise immaculate surface, if no one can accuse me of greed, or of prurience, or of profligacy, if I live a virtuous life, free of defilement (pardon, for a moment, my self-praise), and if I am to my friends a good friend, my father deserves all the credit... As it is now, he deserves from me unstinting gratitude and praise. I could never be ashamed of such a father, nor do I feel any need, as many people do, to apologize for being a freedman's son. Satires 1.6.65-92''

After the assassination of Julius Caesar, Horace joined the army, serving under the generalship of Brutus. He was in the Battle of Philippi, and saved himself by fleeing. When an amnesty was declared for those who had fought against the victorious Augustus, he returned to Italy, only to find his father dead, and his estate confiscated. Horace was reduced to poverty. He was, however, able to purchase a clerkship in the quaestor's office, which allowed him to get by and practice his poetic art.

Horace was a member of a literary circle that included Virgil and Lucius Varius Rufus; they introduced him to Maecenas, friend and confidant of Augustus. Maecenas became his patron and close friend, and presented Horace with an estate near Tibur in the Sabine Hills, contemporary Tivoli. Upon his death bed, having no heirs, Horace relinquished his farm to his friend and Emperor Augustus, to be used for Imperial needs. His farm is there today and is a spot of pilgrimage for the literary elite.

Works

Horace is generally considered by classicists to be, along with Virgil, among the greatest of the Latin poets.

He wrote many Latin phrases that remain in use (in Latin or in translation) including carpe diem, "pluck the day"; Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori; and aurea mediocritas, the "golden mean."

His works (like those of all but the earliest Latin poets) are written in Greek metres, from the hexameter, which was relatively easy to adapt to Latin, to the more complex measures used in the Odes, like alcaics and sapphics, which were sometimes a difficult fit for Latin structure and syntax. Chronologically, they are:

Sermonum liber primus or Satirae I ^* (35 BC)
Epodes ^* (30 BC)
Sermonum liber secundus or Satirae II ^* (30 BC)
Carminum liber primus or Odes I ^* (23 BC)
Carminum liber secundus or Odes II ^* (23 BC)
Carminum liber tertius or Odes III ^* (23 BC)
Epistularum liber primus ^* (20 BC)
Ars Poetica, or The Epistle to the Pisones ^* (18 BC)
Carmen Saeculare or Song of the Ages ^* (17 BC)
Epistularum liber secundus ^* (14 BC)
Carminum liber quartus or Odes IV ^* (13 BC)

Some highlights from his surviving work include:

Odes (or Carmina)

4 books

Carminum liber primus or Odes I ^* (23 BC)
Carminum liber secundus or Odes II ^* (23 BC)
Carminum liber tertius or Odes III ^* (23 BC)
Carminum liber quartus or Odes IV ^* (13 BC)

Epodes

1 book

Epodes ^* (30 BC)

Satires

2 books With the Epistles, these are his most personal works, and perhaps the most accessible to contemporary readers unable to appreciate the verbal magic of the Odes.

Sermonum liber primus or Satirae I ^* (35 BC)
Sermonum liber secundus or Satirae II ^* (30 BC)

Letters or Epistles

2 books With the Satires, these are his most personal works, and perhaps the most accessible to contemporary readers unable to appreciate the verbal magic of the Odes.

Epistularum liber primus ^* (20 BC)
Ars Poetica, or The Epistle to the Pisones ^* (18 BC)
Epistularum liber secundus ^* (14 BC)

One of the Epistles is often referred to as a separate work in itself, the Ars Poetica. In this work, Horace forwards a theory of poetry. His most important tenets are that poetry must be carefully and skillfully worked out on the semantic and formal, and that poetry should be wholesome as well as pleasant. This latter issue is often referred to as the dulce et utile, which is Latin for the sweet and useful. (This work was first translated into English by Queen Elizabeth I).

Carmen Saeculare

Carmen Saeculare or Song of the Ages ^* (17 BC)

In later culture

Dante, in Inferno ranks him side by side with Lucan, Homer, Ovid and Virgil (Inferno, IV,88).
Is the main character of the Oxford Latin Course.

English translators

Perhaps the finest English translator of Horace was John Dryden, who successfully adapted most of the Odes into verse for readers of his own age. These translations are favored by many scholars despite some textual variations. Others favour unrhymed translations.
Ars Poetica was first translated into English by no less than Queen Elizabeth I.

External links

65 BC births | 8 BC deaths | Natives of Basilicata | Roman era poets | Ancient Roman soldiers

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