POET’S CORNER
The son of a local governor or magistrate in Verona, the Roman poet Gaius Valerius Catullus was born in c.82BC and wrote over a hundred untitled poems. 117 of these have survived and they make for a fascinating read as they reveal his thoughts on love, everyday life, and even people he disliked!
Catullus most famous work is the so-called Bedspread Poem (Number 64), which has as its centrepiece a “long, digressive passage” built around the mythical tales decorating the luxury bedspread of one of Jason’s Argonauts. Credited with influencing the poets Horace, Ovid, and Virgil Catullus’s verse alternates between exquisite, passionate, pithy…and even downright filthy!
In this wonderfully lucid original book author Daisy Dunn has brought both the man and his world into sharp, colourful focus.
Reviewed by Juliette Foster
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