The Latin Poetry of Thomas Gray

(Hardback)

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In the first full-scale edition of Thomas Grays Latin poetry, the Latin text and facing English translation are complemented by a detailed introduction and comprehensive commentary that situate Grays Latin verse in relation to his vernacular poetry, epistolary correspondence, and, especially, his appropriation of classical and Neo-Latin literature. This book also traces hitherto unlocated manuscripts of several of his Latin poems, and includes an editio princeps of recently discovered Latin verses pertaining to his Neapolitan sojourn. Grays Latin poetry presents an illuminating portrait of the artist as a young man, mapping his growth and development from his Etonian days to his undergraduate years at Cambridge University, to his continental journey and his return to England. Impressively eclectic in its scope and tone, it ranges from experimental renderings of English, Greek and Italian verse to more strikingly original pieces, including poetic reinterpretations of Alexander Popes Essay on Man and John Lockes An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding. Gray looks back to a classical past, offering imaginative re-readings of Lucretius, Virgil and Horace. At the same time, his Latin verse is firmly rooted in a postclassical world. At its heart is the theme of presences, whether sacred, imagined, absent or remembered, conveyed with a linguistic ingenuity that facilitates the encoding of homoeroticism in a Neo-Latin language of sensibility.

Reviews

Estelle Haan provides the first authoritative edition of Thomas Grays Latin poems with translations, thereby doubling the accessible range of his poetic canon for modern readers who previously have only usually had access to his English verse. -- Michael G. Brennan, Professor of Renaissance Studies, University of Leeds, UK
The Latin Poetry of Thomas Gray provides unique insights into the literary culture of this acclaimed English poet. This first full-scale edition of his Latin poems reveals in expert fashion both their literary merits and their cultural and historical significance. -- Dr. Marc Laureys, Professor of Medieval Latin and Neo-Latin Philology, University of Bonn, Germany

Author Bio

Estelle Haan is Emerita Professor of English and Neo-Latin Studies at Queen's University Belfast, UK. She is author or editor of many books, including John Milton Among the Neapolitans: MansusContexts, Texts, Intertexts (2023) and John Milton: Epistolarum Familiarium Liber Unus and Uncollected Letters (2019).