The Georgics of Virgil

virgil david ferry

John Dryden called Virgil's Georgics, written between 37 and 30 B.C.E., "the best poem by the best poet." The poem, newly translated by the poet and translator David Ferry, is one of the great songs, maybe the greatest we have, of human accomplishment in difficult--and beautiful--circumstances, and in the context of all we share in nature.

The Georgics celebrates the crops, trees, and animals, and, above all, the human beings who care for them. It takes the form of teaching about this care: the tilling of fields, the tending of vines, the raising of the cattle and the bees. There's joy in the detail of Virgil's descriptions of work well done, and ecstatic joy in his praise of the very life of things, and passionate commiseration too, because of the vulnerability of men and all other creatures, with all they have to contend with: storms, and plagues, and wars, and all mischance.

Genres poetryclassicsfictionphilosophyliteratureancientancient historymythologyromanclassic literature

224 pages, Paperback

First published January 1,-0029

This edition

Format: 224 pages, Paperback
Published: May 2, 2006 by Farrar, Straus \u0026 Giroux
ISBN: 9780374530310
ASIN: 0374530319
Language: English

About the author

virgil

born 15 October 70 BC
died 21 September 19 BC

Roman poet Virgil, also Vergil, originally Publius Vergilius Maro, composed the Aeneid, an epic telling after the sack of Troy of the wanderings of Aeneas.

Work of Virgil greatly influenced on western literature; in most notably Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri.