Ovid's Fasti

`Review from other book by this author This study will be essential reading for anyone interested in the Augustan period, from a literary, topographical, or political point of view.' Christopher Smith, The Classical Review `A fine example of how to analyse the effect of political power on a writer and his work.' Thomas Wiedemann, Greece and Rome `Herbert-Brown's powerful discussions of those episodes in the Fasti that relate to the imperial house stand in an older tradition of scholarship on 'history of Ovid'...H.B. is very impressive in her control of the historical evidence and in her ability to combine it into large-scale hypothetical structures to provide usually convincing backgrounds to details of selection and emphasis in Ovid's treatment of the imperial household.' Philip Hardie, New Hall, Cambridge, Journal of Hellenic Studies `This revised doctoral thesis is a learned and closely argued work that reads Ovid's Fasti essentially as a historical document. The book is well organized and produced ... There is no question but that the author has a thorough command of the historical evidence that bears on her subject. Her imagination is vivid and detailed, her attempts to reconstruct the ideological forces that shaped Augustus' Principate and Ovid's poem always challenging and instructive ... can ... be read with profit: it is full of useful information and challenging analysis ... A book to be used.' Joseph Farrell, University of Pennsylvania, American Journal of Philology 12/97