Press

Here it is, the flos florum, the mother of all Latin anthologies, and in David Traill’s superb new presentation it deserves a Pindaric victory ode. At nearly 1,400 pages and gorgeously produced, this two-volume edition of the “the Beuern Abbey poems” is a magnificent achievement. It is a model of translation-as-interpretation and concise commentary, and it opens the Carmina Burana up to extensive as well as close reading and to aesthetic as well as textual criticism. Before getting to specifics, I salute the

Magee’s first full translation in English of Calcidius, together with his introduction and the notes, is a major contribution to the field of philosophy in late antiquity and will greatly enhance future research on Calcidius. The author accomplishes the considerable feat of both locating Calcidius in the context of ancient philosophy and addressing his influence on the Middle Ages. Traditionally, and since Waszink’s edition, Calcidius has been ranked among the Latin Christian Neoplatonists, but Magee’s introduction makes amply clear how

The Carmina Burana (“Songs of Beuren”) is unquestionably the most famous collection of medieval poetry in the modern imagination, in no small part because of the industry of the composer Carl Orff (1895-1982), who in 1937 put twenty-four of these poems to music for chorus and orchestra. His arrangements have subsequently enjoyed immense success in concert halls, television commercials, and film soundtracks. Given the enduring popularity of Orff’s compositions, it is surprising that the enterprise of translating the entire manuscript of the Carmina

Neilos, who died in 1004, was a Greek monk who lived in southern Italy under the Byzantine Empire. The Life of Neilos offers a snapshot of a distinctive time when Greek and Latin monasticism coexisted, a world that vanished after the schism between the churches of Rome and Constantinople in 1054. The translation was edited by Dr. Ines Angeli Murzaku Professor of Church History and Director of Catholic Studies Program at Seton Hall University in New Jersey, Dr. Raymond Capra,

Michael Roberts’s goal is to produce a readable and accurate translation of Fortunatus’s Latin, printed with some changes from Friedrich Leo’s MGH edition. His versions of the poems are in prose, and literal rather than free. Since roughly half of Fortunatus’s poems fall under the categories of epithalamium, consolatio, encomium, epitaph, hymn, or ecclesiastical commemoration, this approach energizes a volume of many strengths. Readers with some or no Latin now have incomparable interpretive tools to ponder the poetic riches of

One book published this year, by which I was both edified and delighted, was The Life of St. Neilos of Rossano, translated into English by Raymond L. Capra, Ines A. Murzaku, and Douglas J. Milewski. The period in which St. Neilos lived in Italy, the 10th century—which saw Muslim incursions and advances, Byzantine assertions of power and political authority, piracy, and all manner of intrigue—by itself guaranteed the read would be captivating. The translators, however, provide the reader with an elegant