Book Description
This new translation in free verse conveys the full force of Lucan's writing and his grimly realistic view of the subject. The Introduction sets the scene for the reader unfamiliar with Lucan and explores his relationship with earlier writers of Latin epic, and his interest in the sensational. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Underrated Historical Epic
An underrated work of the Silver Age. There are some excellent epsiodes that could stand on their own as mini-epics: the suicides of Vulteius and comrades, Appius 'rape' of the Pythia, Caesar's journey by sea, Scaeva's aristeia, Erictho's necromancy, and Cato's journey through Africa to name just a few. The historical insights into the lives of Caesar, Pompey, and Cato are also especially enlightening. Absolutely worth a first and second look!

"Gore, War, and Monumental Verse"
Lucan, the author of the full-throated but incomplete epic the "Civil War", certainly deserves a spot next to the great Latin poets Ovid, Horace, and Virgil, whose epic works mark the pinnacleeloquence and intelligence of Latin verse. The epic was written during the reign of Nero in the first century AD, and it is characterized by its vehement condemnation of civil war and imperialistic sentiments--this possibly caused Lucan's later fall out of Nero's favor. The primary characters in the epic are Julius Caesar, who is portrayed as a destructive warmonger, and Pompey (Magnus), who is described as ambitious and over his prime. The vivid descriptions of the wars in this work are exciting and at the same time sobering since Lucan's narrative never fails to reveal those attributes of civil war which invoke the most disturbing of feelings. For all this, Lucan's "Civil War" is recommended, and also because the Oxford World Classics always present reliable translations, and this particular edition retains Lucan's charming and long-winded verse that courses so smoothly through the hearts and minds reader's who are fortunate enough to come into contact with it.

Another version of Lucan
If I had known it was another translation of Lucan, I would not have ordered it, BUT I would have made a mistake.This work has a better translation for the modern reader, and lots of good supporting information. Some of the comparisons I made with other versions make me wish I had thisten years ago.The notes are worth the price of the book! ... Read more

Book Description
The great poem about the civil war between Julius Caesar and the forces of the Roman Senate led by PompeyDownload Description
Lucan's take on some guy name of Caesar crossing the Rubicon to duke it out with a volcano -- maybe I have that wrong, but you'll need to read the book to find out. ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (5)

Bad theory, good result
The basic hypothesis of this book (that Lucan made his way to India and livedas a recluse under the name of Barry Halpin) was shown to be incorrect soon after its publication. But for a number of reasons this book is still well worth reading.

It provides a well-written account of the crime and its aftermath and the effect which Lucan's status had on the investigation. It gives a fascinating and contrasting view into the life of people on the fringes of society in Goa in the 1970s, harmless, inconsequential souls aside from their unwitting participation in this case of mistaken identity. And it serves as an interesting example of how a substantial body of evidence, gathered in earnest, can still yield a totally wrong conclusion. Might have rated 5 stars if the theory was right.

Great for true crime fans, even if you don't know about Lord Lucan.
Having no concept of who Lord Lucan was, I was intrigued by the back cover synopsis and picked up the book as a light read. I was pleasantly surprised. The book is engrossing and both explained the background of the Earl and the crime and delve into the international pursuit of Lucan. Just as interesting is the treatment of the elite in the eyes of the law and the fact that the interest in this character continued for so many years after his escape.

Instead of light reading, I was simply unable to put this book down. While there has been subsequent press claiming that the findings of this investigation have been flawed and that Lord Lucan has still not been found, I came away feeling that if this was in fact the Earl, his self-imposed exile and the life that he created in Goa must surely have been worse than the punishment that he would have received (considering his status and powerful friends) had he stayed and faced the music.

A must read for anyone interested in the case and a recommended read for anyone interested in true crime.

Mystery Solved
I'd like to start this review by stating I spent a fair amount of my time in Goa in the 80's and knew Barry Halpin well. He was a bearded drop out, who had turned to booze in a big way. He retained his Lancashire accent, but from memory, I never once saw him play backgammon. However, he wasn't the only long haired, long bearded Englishman who had 'escaped' to Goa. I can think of one or two others who settled there and who now that the suggestion has been put in my mind, could have been Lord 'Lucky' Lucan.

Like Winch, I recall an articulate and clearly well read Englishman who received "out of place" visitors from the UK. He did play backgammon and from memory was very reserved. The man depicted in the top photo opposite page 48, is in my opinion, Halpin. The man featured on the front cover and elsewhere in the book, is not. He is the articulate, quiet, backgammon playing Englishman I describe.

When all is said and done, this book has rekindled the saga and will leave the reader scratching their head, asking, "Is it, or isn't it him?" I knew both men. The mystery has in my opinion been solved.

Tantalizing Read!
The news that Lord Lucan's disappearance had been solved reached the States.I arrived in London the day after the story broke, determined to buy the book and read for myself the fate of Lucan.I was first assaulted with Fleet Street headlines, boldly claiming that the story wasn't true.Being a critical thinker, I wondered why "The Guardian" was claiming that Barry Halpin was a banjo player from St. Helens, but as the author of the book was quoted in the article, "Where is the photographic proof?""The Guardian" used the author's photos for their story disclaiming the author's story.The only Fleet Street paper that had photographs that day was, "The Sun," and any critically thinking person could tell those pictures were computer generated!All these counter-claims did nothing to dissuade me from purchasing the book that day.I wanted to decide for myself if the discovery made by this former, decorated Scotland Yard detective was a plausible explanation for the whereabouts of Lord Lucan after that fateful night in November 1974.

MacLaughlin gives us much detail concerning the life of Lucan, his foibles and dark nature developing with his love of gambling.His marriage to social climber Veronica Duncan began well enough, but the erratic behaviour of Lady Lucan coupled with the spiral of Lord Lucan's fortunes at the gaming tables brought misfortune to their home as well.The final days brought a bitter custody dispute over their three children.Lord Lucan was initially granted temporary custody, but subsequently lost it when he overstepped the authority of the courts and took the children himself.He was left with a large legal bill, one he could not afford.And this is when it is believed he started making his plans.

Lord Lucan was well placed aristocracy, which was to the detriment of the murdered nanny, Sandra Rivet.Something that is obvious in this book is the concern the author has for the victim, and her son who was left motherless.Scotland Yard treated Lord Lucan with kid gloves in the hours and days after the murder.This enabled Lucan to make his getaway, using his network of close-mouthed, arrogant (by reason of wealth and class) friends to aid in his escape from the law.Lord Lucan's friends surrounded and protected him in his trouble, and helped him not only leave England, but brought him money and shared their friendship with him while Lucan was hiding in Goa, India.

MacLaughlin provides us compelling evidence that Lord Lucan made his way down to Goa, India, to live out his life in a drunken stupor.His witness list includes Indians who worked and lived on the shores of this once renegade spot on the map.Lord Lucan as Barry Halpin had many similarities, including backgammon gambling, alcohol, and a love for music.

After death by cirrhosis, the end of Lucan came in a pyrotechnic display. His body was doused in his favourite drink, feni, and burned on a pyre.The ashes were spread at the bottom of a waterfall, and it was his fait accompli.He had completely disappeared, and escaped the long arm of the law.But I wonder, with the life Lucan lived in Goa, if some hand of justice wasn't dealt him after all.

Well writtten, but
The book is very well written, looks very professional and puts forward a convincing argument for the hypothesis that Lord Lucan adopted the name Barry Halpin in Goa. Unfortunately the whole theory fell apart shortly before the book was published when it was discovered that Barry Halpin really was Barry Halpin, a hippy banjo player from Yorkshire who travelled around the world and settled in India. Enough friends and relatives came forward to identify the man in the photograph as Halpin. But I can understand the author; if I had spent years writing a book and then I discovered that it was fundamentally flawed just before publication, I would be reluctant to accept the truth. ... Read more

Book Description
Always observing the established techniques of New Testament analysis, especially redaction criticism, Professor Esler makes extensive use of sociology and anthropology to examine the author of Luke-Acts' theology as a response to social and political pressures on the Christian community for whom he was writing. Various themes such as table-fellowship, the law, the temple, poverty and riches, and politics are examined to determine how they have been influenced by the social and political background of Luke's audience.This book offers a New Testament paradigm and warrant for those interested in generating a theology attuned to the social and political realities affecting contemporary Christian congregations. ... Read more

Book Description
This edition offers the first full-scale commentary on the neglected second book of Lucan's epic poem on the civil war between Caesar and Pompey: De bello civili. It pays particular attention to Lucan's inheritance from Virgil's Augustan epic and response to its challenge. The introduction gives a general account of Lucan's life and work, a discussion of his narrative, a survey of language, style and meter, and a brief history of the text. The commentary offers assistance with grammar and translation and aims to provide the political, historical and geographical background to Lucan's epic narrative. ... Read more

Book Description
How should we react as readers and as critics when two passages in a literary work contradict one another? Classicists once assumed that all inconsistencies in ancient texts needed to be amended, explained away, or lamented. Building on recent work on both Greek and Roman authors, this book explores the possibility of interpreting inconsistencies in Roman epic. After a chapter surveying Greek background material including Homer, tragedy, Plato and the Alexandrians, five chapters argue that comparative study of the literary use of inconsistencies can shed light on major problems in Catullus' Peleus and Thetis, Lucretius' De Rerum Natura, Vergil's Aeneid, Ovid's Metamorphoses, and Lucan's Bellum Civile. Not all inconsistencies can or should be interpreted thematically, but numerous details in these poems, and some ancient and modern theorists, suggest that we can be better readers if we consider how inconsistencies may be functioning in Greek and Roman texts. ... Read more

Book Description
In the tradition of “true crime” books, The Gamblers follows the fortunes of five men at the center of the ultra-fashionable Clermont Set including the infamous Lord Lucan who disappeared following the murder of his children’s nanny. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Fascinating... but true?
Headlined as an investigation into the lives of three of the UK's most notorious 60's gamblers - James Goldsmith, John Aspinall & "Lucky" Lord Lucan - and claiming to reveal, for the first time, the true story behind Lucan's even more notorious "disappearance" - one of the UK's longest running murder mysteries - "The Gamblers" is a quite riveting insight into a bizarre world of power, glamour, addiction, fabulous wealth and self destruction. Like the friend who recommended it to me I read it virtually straight through and while I left with as many questions as answers I discovered, on the way, a whole host of mind-boggling facts about the people who populated London's most exclusive gambling den, "The Clermont Club", and its now iconic sister night-club, "Annabel's".

Cleverly underpinned by sufficient clearly genuine information to make you believe it all, you are, by the last third of the book, quite prepared to fully accept Pearson's take on Lucan's fate, even though the lines between objective analysis and sensationalist interpretation have in fact become fairly blurred. But no matter because, in the end, "The Gamblers" is much more than simply another title-selling angle on the Lord Lucan saga, rather an intriguing exploration into a part of London's "swinging sixties" scene that most of us never knew existed and a fascinating study of what draws the rich & privileged into the ridiculously high-risk world of big-money gambling.

... Read more

Book Description
The Pharsalia, Lucan's epic on the civil war between Caesar and Pompey, is a document of fundamental importance for students of the history and literature of Rome in the early imperial period. Whether one is a historian of the Republican opposition to Nero, or a literary critic teasing out the ideological implications of intertextuality, it is impossible to ignore this poem.Taking as his guiding theme the unusual prominence of spectacle and spectators in the Pharsalia - the tendency of either the narrator to represent complicity with or apathy towards the action of various charactyers as that of one who watches and does not engage, or of individual characters to celebrate the actions which they undertake by turning them into theatrical displays for others to watch - Dr Leigh demonstrates the importance of this phenomenon for narrative, and intertextual concerns as well as for history and socio-political matters. He shows how Lucan can take devices characteristic of Virgilian narrative and transform them to launch an attack on the Augustan ideology of the Aeneid and produce a savagely Republican anti-Aeneid which represents the civil wars as the death of Rome.By studying the tension between the narrator's impassioned interventions and his characters' often manic zeal to transform civil war into performance, this work discovers a Lucan who is as funny as he is serious, as reflective as he is committed. ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (1)

I expected more detail of the building in this book.
I thought that since this book is only about the one building, it would cover most aspects of it, if not all of them. I specifically needed to better understand the construction method which could have been done using a detailed section.I would have even been happy with text describing what type of framing was used, basically any part of the construciton. What I got with this book wasmerely images of the building.None gave me a better understanding of how it was constructed and most of the images in the book can be found online.So unless all you want is a collection of images about the Goetz Gallery, I don't recommend this book. ... Read more

Book Description
This book is a major literary reevaluation of Lucan's epic poem, the Bellum Civile ("The Civil War"). Its main purpose is to bring out the implications of one basic premise: this poem is not only about civil war, but uses the metaphor of civil war (i.e. self-destruction and internal discord) as the basis for the way it tells its story. Aimed primarily at classicists, the book offers a provocative new interpretation of most of the important issues in the poem, while attempting to avoid the glibness of generalization by concentrating on detailed readings of selected parts of the text. ... Read more

Book Description
Despite the modern fascination with Marlowe--particularly with his Dr. Faustus--there has been no edition of his works in the original spelling, with full textual apparatus and a detailed commentary.The Oxford English Texts Complete Works of Christopher Marlowe fills the need for a fully
annotated scholarly treatment of the works.Volume I contains all his translations from classical poetry, comparing the English verse with the Latin and Greek originals.The editor discusses Marlowe's skill as a translator and his art as a poet, and provides clear explanations of all difficult
expressions and obscure allusions. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

As good as it could get
well i thought that the book was good, and even though it was introduced to me in high school, i think that maybe it is for the more mature crowd. if you can get passed the text then you will really enjoy the book. it isbest to read the book along with its footnotes.not only is it a littleeasier on the reader, but it is also more enjoyable when you can actuallyunderstand what it is you are reading.but over all the book wasexcellent.i think of it as one of marlowe's greatest works. ... Read more

Product Description
This selection of passages from the epic poets of the Silver Latin age of poetry (AD 14-117) is aimed at late school and university students. It is provided with a useful short introduction, the Latin texts, a commentary giving guidance on context and syntax, and an appendix of comparative passages from Virgil and Ennius.Passages included are:Lucan 1.33-66, 1.524-549, 3.399-452, 5.169-197, 5.504-596, 8.698-711, 9.1-18Valerius Flaccus 1.608-642, 2.38-58, 5.416-454, 5.329-342, 6.575-601, 6.752-760, 7.1-25, 7.78-81, 7.103-126Silius Italicus 4.81-87, 7.282-307, 10.527-542, 13.326-340, 13.806-822, 16.229-244Statius:Thebaid 2.496-526, 3.420-439, 4.786-796, 5.361-375, 6.54-73, 8.373-394, 8.548-553, 9.885-907, 10.134-155Statius:Achilleid 1.363-375 ... Read more