The Complete Poetry of Catullus: Polymetrics, Long Poems, Elegies, and Epigrams

Gaius Valerius Catullus

Gaius Valerius Catullus (84–54 BC) was the greatest lyric poet of Ancient Rome, a younger contemporary of Cicero and Caesar, and a predecessor of Virgil and other poets of the “golden age” of Roman literature. The creator of subjective lyric and the leader of the Neoterics (“new poets”), Catullus, who was a native of Verona, died under unknown circumstances in Rome. He wrote erotic and satirical poetry, long poems on mythological themes, as well as elegies and epigrams. They were arranged into a single book of poems by Catullus which included more than 120 poetic works. As a poet, Catullus was rediscovered in the early fourteenth century and his poetry had a significant influence on Renaissance poets. He was not in school curricula, but his poems were quoted in poetics courses, in particular at the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy. Although Catullus’ poems began to be translated into Ukrainian more than a hundred years ago (Taras Franko and Mykola Zerov were among the first translators), the complete collection of his poetry in Ukrainian translations is published now for the first time. This is a bilingual edition. The Latin originals are based on Renaissance manuscripts and editions. The commentaries take into account Catullan studies from the Renaissance to the present day.