Overview

James Bradley Wells shares his poet’s soul and scholar’s eye in this thought-provoking new translation of two of Vergil’s early works, the Eclogues and Georgics. With its emphasis on a natural rather than stylized rhythm, Eclogues and Georgics honors the original spirit of ancient Roman poetry as both a written and performance-based art form. The accompanying introductory essays situate both sets of poems in a rich literary tradition. Wells provides historical context and literary analysis of these two works, eschewing facile interpretations of these oft examined texts and ensconcing them in the society and culture from which they originated.   The translations in Eclogues and Georgics are augmented with annotated essays, a pronunciation guide, and a glossary. These supplementary materials, alongside Wells’s bold vision for what translation choices can reveal, promote radically democratizing access for readers with an interest in classics or poetry.

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Wells's translations are poetry in their own right--the work of a poet and created as poetic works--and marry deft use of English rhythms and cadences with fidelity to Vergil's Latin. The skillful metrical scheme and lexical choices (especially the striking and inventive compounds) make it a pleasure to read. I felt as though I was reading both texts anew. --Tedd A. Wimperis, Elon University

Of all the great poems of the Latin tradition, Vergil's Eclogues and Georgics are notoriously the most elusive of fine translation. The poetic strength of Wells's fine new versions derives from a precise yet flexible English line and a rendering of Vergil's language that is as clear eyed and unsentimental as any we are likely to encounter. --William Levitan, Grand Valley State University That Wells comes at Vergil from two angles of approach--that of classics scholar and that of a poet in his own right--makes him perhaps uniquely qualified to deliver us these exciting new translations of Eclogues and Georgics. The triumph here is that Wells brilliantly grafts elements of English prosody onto Vergil's original, enriching the work without obscuring its original cultural context. Indeed, Wells's innovative application of Hopkins-esque sprung-rhythm and compounds--hawkshriek, ironrust, doombent--enlivens the text, helping Vergil's work take on new resonance and urgency in English. As a piece of translation and a piece of poetry, Wells's innovation is refreshing and his achievement is tremendous. --Iain Haley Pollock, winner of the Cave Canem Poetry Prize and author of Ghost, like a Place

Author Information

James Bradley Wells is an associate professor of classical studies at DePauw University. He has worked widely as a poet, translator, and critic. He is author of Pindar's Verbal Art and his own original poetry has been collected and published in Bicycle and The Kazantzakis Guide to Greece.

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