The Poems and Fragments of Catullus

The Poems and Fragments of Catullus gathers the surviving work of Rome‘s most volatile and intimate lyric voice: love poems to Lesbia, invective against rivals, witty social epigrams, learned miniatures, and ambitious mythological pieces such as the epyllion on Peleus and Thetis. Written in metres adapted from Greek lyric and Hellenistic poetry, these poems combine polished artistry with startling immediacy. They stand at the centre of the neoteric movement, rejecting grand public epic for refinement, personal feeling, and verbal brilliance. Gaius Valerius Catullus, born at Verona around 84 BCE and active in the late Roman Republic, belonged to a cultivated provincial elite drawn into the social and political world of Rome. His poems reflect friendships, patronage networks, literary rivalries, and a famously turbulent affair often identified with Clodia. The instability, ambition, and sophistication of Caesar‘s Rome sharpened his art, making private emotion inseparable from public wit and cultural critique. This volume is indispensable for readers of classical literature, love poetry, and the history of the lyric self. Catullus is obscene, tender, erudite, cruel, and unforgettable; his fragments still feel modern because they make desire and language equally dangerous.