Quintus Horatius Flaccus (65 BC - 8 BC), commonly known as Horace, was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus. The rhetorician Quintilian regarded his Odes as just about the only Latin lyrics worth reading: «He can be lofty sometimes, yet he is also full of charm and grace, versatile in his figures, and felicitously daring in his choice of words».
Horace also crafted elegant hexameter verses (Satires and Epistles) and caustic iambic poetry (Epodes). The hexameters are amusing yet serious works, friendly in tone, leading the ancient satirist Persius to comment: «as his friend laughs, Horace slyly puts his finger on his every fault; once let in, he plays about the heartstrings».
His career coincided with Rome's momentous change from a republic to an empire. An officer in the republican army defeated at the Battle of Philippi in 42 BC, Horace was befriended by Octavian's right-hand man in civil affairs, Maecenas, and became a spokesman for the new regime.
Today we present to our readers one of Horace's most beautiful works, Ars Poetica (The Art of Poetry), written around 10 BC and dedicated to the Pisos, translated into English in 1874 by John Conington.