CARRUBBA, R.W.,
The Epodes of Horace. A Study in Poetic Arrangement.
Mouton, The Hague / Paris, 1969. 114p. Card bourd cover with dust wrps. Signature on half title. Series: Studies in Classical Literature 9. (Rare). ‘Perfunctory ‘chapters’ chronology and meter lead up to the real meat of this study, some sixty pages in which Carruba details a thematic pattern superimposed on the more obvious metrical arrangement of the ‘Epodes’. He sees the book composed of two halves (1-8 and 9-17), with numerous aspects of similarity too complex to outline here. A final chapter serves to undermine the view that Horace’s order was determined by that of Archilochus. (…) Even so slim a volume devoted to the arrangement of seventeen relatively short poems might seem rather lavish treatment. However, C.’s subtitle is somewhat misleading. He analyses the structure not only of the book as a whole but also of many individual pieces. (…) these latter discussions, while not strictly relevant to the central topic, contain much of interest; and their inclusion can, in a way, be justified, since C. finds some of the same principles of organisation operative on the level of both poem and book. The analyses display considerable acuteness. There is, perhaps, a slight tendency to overinterpret a circumstance of text.(…) C. can teach us much, and his study performs a valuable service for this most neglected of Horace’s works.’ (THOMAS A SUITS in The Classical World, 1970, pp.91-92).
€ 45.00
(Antiquarian)