This book locates the work of Virgil in the politics of his day. It examimes closely the logic and the literary genres of Virgil's poems. It rewrites, mainly from the Greek historians Appian and Dio, the political culture of a period frequently neglected or misunderstood, the decades following the death of Julius Caesar in 44 BC. And it argues that a guiding purpose in all three of Virgil's works, Eclogues, Georgics and Aeneid, was to address and to paliate the unpopularity, the weakness, of Caesar's heir, Octavian. Combining the literary analysis of Latin poetry with the criticism of Greek and Roman political writers in prose, the author offers numerous insights into the poetic values and the architectural achievement of Virgil.
