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Nunc est bibendum – to Horace, the lusty rebel

Peter Stothard’s portrait of an ambitious young Lothario running wild and refusing to knuckle down is certainly not the Horace we know from Latin lessons

7 June 2025

9:00 AM

7 June 2025

9:00 AM

Horace: Poet on a Volcano Peter Stothard

Yale, pp.328, 18.99

Horace suffers from a reputation as an old man’s poet. Classicists often joke that Catullus and Martial are for the young, and Horace for those of a certain vintage – wine being a favourite Horatian theme. Many lose their thirst for his Odes at school, only to realise their brilliance decades later.

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