Author Description

This book is a parallel translation from the Greek language.In making accessible through sound texts and scholarly translations some of the more important monuments of Greek criticism Professor Roberts has done a pioneer service for English-speaking students which might almost be compared with the more sensational labors of the explorers of Egyptian tombs. He has discovered for large numbers of readers books which would have continued as unknown as the lost plays of Menander. If a scholar of taste and ability will for the general good submit himself patiently and without evasion to the pitfalls laid for the translator by a technical and highly specialized vocabulary, he deserves infinite commendation for his courage, his candor, and, in the event of success, for his scholarship. Such reward Professor Roberts has earned before in his translations of Longinus, Dionysius, and Demetrius, and in fuller measure he earns it again for this last product of his zealous interest in Greek rhetoric.In the present volume he has given us a careful text based upon Usener's, and he has made what is apparently the first translation that has ever been produced in English. This is really the "feature" of the edition, and it deserves great praise. It is fluent, readable, and a quick and accurate guide to the interpretation of the Greek text. The annotation is more illustrative than exegetical. A valuable glossary of rhetorical terms has been added which will be of much service for the study of other documents in the same field. In the Introduction and also in the annotation Professor Roberts has been at pains, as he says, "to suggest some of the many points at which Dionysius' principles and precepts are applicable to the modern languages and literatures." This confession of purpose it is fair to keep in mind in passing judgment upon the work as a whole.... --Classical Philology, Volume 5