I enjoyed this book as accomplishing the discovery of Virgil's views and its beautiful language.

It’s Vergilius, what do you want me to say? I’d give him six out of five stars if I could.

Virgil is interesting, to say the least. His apparent obsession with hard work and the country probably arose from his move from the countryside to Rome during Octavian's rise to power. I don't often enjoy poetry, but this time it was tolerable, so I gave it three stars. His reference to a boy savior born of a virgin is mysterious, but most likely refers to Octavian rather than Christ, as Augustine thought. Overall, it's a good read and insightful.

I love used book sales. If you’ve ever gone ‘garage sale-ing’, then you’re probably familiar with the types of pushy scavengers that you might meet at a used book sale. You’d almost think Dickens had these bibliophiles in mind for his caricature of Scrooge in the opening chapter of A Christmas Carol: “…a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, …secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster.” Solitary, that is, until they catch the scent of a musty book in the air that could be had for a buck. Watching the doors open for a used book sale can cause you to lose faith in humanity. But as I said, I’m a used-book scavenger myself, and I only hope that my love for life ultimately outstrips my lust for books.

So what does this have to do with Virgil? Well, I found a book containing three of Virgil’s works at the last sale (with over a million books!…humina, humina), and I tucked it away on a bookshelf for a rainy day. Well my friends, that day came a week ago. Imagine, if you will, me deciding on a whim that I REALLY wanted to read some of Virgil, forgetting that I had the book on hand, scouring my shelves for the next book to read, and stumbling upon this little ruby. I AM! I actually wanted to read only the Eclogues and Georgics, not the more famous Aeneid, mostly because I’ve heard that the former were much more poetic than the adventurous latter. My plan is to read the whole of Dante’s Divine Comedy soon (I’ve only read the Inferno up till now), and for some reason it has always intrigued me that Dante, one of the most celebrated authors of all time, chose Virgil as his guide through Hades.

The Eclogues are pastoral (rural) poems and songs written in the tradition of a shepherd sing-off. Speakers take turns trying to ‘one-up’ their opponents in a friendly game of lyrical improvisation (freestyle rap battle!!) about the country life. I’m sure in the day they had their Eminems and Jay-Z’s, but this is hardly anything a 21st century man can relate to. Between the references to antiquated cultural traditions and the constant allusion to Roman mythology, I wasn’t able to make much of it. Unfortunately you’ll need a history/mythology buff to help break down the ‘thick accent’. It’s almost lost to all but a few super-conditioned readers.

The Georgics, on the other hand, were a different story altogether. I wouldn’t quite give it the accolade that was offered in the introduction of the Modern Library version: “…perhaps the most perfect work of Virgil…No one who reads the magnificent passage in the second book (lines 136-137) can fail to be thrilled with its patriotic fervor.” I beg to differ with you Charles L. Durham (whoever you are), I failed to be thrilled by almost all of it. Don’t get me wrong, I do sense the Shakespearean brilliance and perpetual poetry of every line crafted with the utmost care to extract the sweet wine of beauty and truth out of every word, but I must be a few millennia off. Doesn’t hit me quite the way Shakespeare does, I’m sure because I speak the same language and I’m in the same general epoch as the Man. There were a couple sublime verses that I could detect, however, like:

“The grasses dare in safety to trust themselves to spring rain.”
“Neither might things so delicate endure this their toil, except such space of calm passed between the cold and the heat, and earth were cradled by an indulgent sky.”
“Lost to fame, let me love stream and woodland.”
“But we have crossed a boundless breadth of plain, and now is time to loosen the necks of our steaming horses.”
Overall, I considered this worth my time. If nothing else, it’s a piece of history and some of its poetry remains translucent for us. I hope to read the Aeneid sometime in the future, and even sooner I plan on picking up The Divine Comedy to be reunited with this Dante’s dubious choice of a guide.

After reading some of the reviews I'm convinced that I don't have a literate opinion. This reading was a second time for me. The first I read was a different translation back in the 1980's and I had trouble seeing the words on the pages. The same thing happened again with this edition. I have reading glasses, but the sentences kept fading on the page. This phenomena has never happened with any other book and I've read 1,000 books to date. I can only say that the title is haunted and some god or goddess who does not want me to read it cursed the title for me. I did it anyway. It was beautiful. Pagan and decadent I found words of wise and uninhibited lust in the Eclogues and true husbandry in Georgics. As a layman of Latin I found the names at times unrecognizable but the translation I read was readable. I'll chalk my vision problem up to the words being so bright and the source of intense condensed thought from the origins of the Western Civilization. You can't see the sun without a devise that prohibits being blinded by it. Overall getting a glimpse of Roman bucolic writing was a nice experience.

Just for those who have never seen a Loeb-it has the original Latin (or Greek) on one side with the translation on the following page. The Loeb series are known for their excellent translations and are vital to any researcher or historian who wants to return to the orginal for their primary source. Virgil's Georgics alone make this book a necessity (the Georgics used to be standard reading before and after the revolution in universities) and the Aeneid provides an excellent balance to the Eclouges and the Georgics. Virgil's writings are fairly simple yet convey both the message and the image of what he wishes to get across to the reader. The Loeb series are a bit more pricey than the Penguin translations but the added luxury of the Latin text make this series indispensable to the student or reseacher of Rome or the Latin language.

A fantastic translation of Virgil’s poetry - unusual, free, interpretive and contemplative. It’s not a straight translation, so those looking for something following Virgil’s meter and form should look elsewhere. But this interpretative translation adds a whole another dimension, relating the ancient Roman world to modern times.

“Ah! life’s best hours are ever first to fly
From hapless mortals; in their place succeed
Disease and dolorous eld; till travail sore
And death unpitying sweep them from the scene.”, p. 69

Agradezco a Alianza que haya sacado las dos juntas, ya que las Geórgicas suele ser más complicado pillarlas editadas (sin que sea Gredos). La traducción es un poco... pues eso, tres estrellas. Suenta todo un poco ripioso y cursi en las bucólicas y un poco densísimo en las Geórgicas. Pero bueno, seré yo que no sé. Y el problema no es Virgilio. Hiperión hizo una edición de las Bucólicas mucho más respetuosa y lírica, pero hay que agradecer el esfuerzo a Alianza.

I appreciate "the pastoral this and the pastoral that"; Ecologue X where we can accredit the notion "love conquers all" is probably the only thing i'll remember though.

Es el primer libro de poesía latina que leo, y me ha costado un poco.

El lenguaje no es, desde luego, el del día a día. En muchos puntos es enrevesado y hay muchas palabras poco usadas y arcaicas. Esto es de esperar en una traducción de poesía latina, nada fuera de lo común.

La temática también se me ha hecho compleja. En primer lugar, nunca había leído un libro de poesía bucólica, ni de poesía latina. Me han impresionado, sobre todo, las Geórgicas, que es un manual para el buen agricultor... No me lo esperaba.

También hay muchas referencias culturales, a personajes que no conozco y a deidades menores, lo que hace que tenga la sensación de haberme perdido parte del contenido implícito de los poemas.

En conclusión, creo que a quien le guste la poesía, o la cultura antigua va a disfrutar de estas obras. Están muy bien escritas y son muy agradables de leer, aunque sean complejas. El curioso también va a encontrar una literatura y poesía diferentes y de altísima calidad.

Pero, si no eres ninguno de esos perfiles, no te lo recomendaría. Personalmente, siento que voy a tener que volver a estos poemas cuando tenga más conocimiento sobre la cultura romana, para exprimirlos al máximo. Le pongo tres estrellas porque me falta conocimiento para apreciarlo realmente.

I read this concurrently w/ 'Less is More' by Jason Hickel, which starts out w/ a (pretty simplistic) synopsis of the history of Capitalism. The central argument though is that the Capitalist system was initially enabled by the artificial creation of scarcity and the violent appropriation of others' wealth. And the author talks about this taking place first during the enclosure movement - which kicked peasants off of land and out of communities that were largely self sustaining, all in the name of progress and increasing the productivity of the land and the peasants. (Howard Zinn makes a similar argument).

Hickel argues that the enclosure movement was the first time in history that people were systematically removed from their livelihoods in this fashion - but of course we know that's not true. The same was happening in Virgil's time and for largely similar reasons. Farmers were removed from public land in Roman Italy by force, first by rich urban elites consolidating their holdings during the Gracchi troubles and then by all of the soldiers who needed to be placated after the civil wars wound down. It's striking to read these two things side by side, and to think that similar socio-economic contexts operated in 50 BCE and 1500 CE.

I know this is a bit trite, but it's really got me thinking about human history as a struggle between a large and dispersed group of people who are living fairly contentedly with their lot and a much smaller group who are trying to take common resources to accrue greater economic/political power for themselves. Soil actually seems like a great representation of that. Farmers working an area for their livelihood have every incentive to treat soil well and keep crops in healthy rotation. It's only when you have a market incentive based on cash crops that you try to suck out as much fertility as possible before moving onto the next plot of land. Capitalism provides both incentive and method for unsustainable exploitation of natural resources. On the other hand, Virgil's writing is a very beautiful demonstration of the knowledge developed and care taken of the land by people who lived on it.

None of these are new ideas. I do wonder though if, as they make their way into mainstream consciousness and the environmental movement, they might allow for a pendulum swing of history back away from concentration of power in the hands of elites and the resultant pillaging of the environment. I still feel like rewilding is a potential philosophical torch to lead the way. But it seems like some ... class consciousness (to borrow a phrase from a movement that didn't work out very well) is required to motivate people shake off the old ways and follow the positive vision rewilding provides.