<p>The Roman poet Propertius is best known as the writer who perfected the Latin love elegy, a technical as much as a psychological and cultural feat. Propertius has been admired for both his metrical genius and the modernity of his narrative flow.</p><p>Many of the poems here pay tribute to Cynthia, Propertius's romantic obsession, but the scope of these 107 elegies is broad. Propertius's poetry offers a fascinating look into life in the Augustan age, addressing social, political, and historical subjects. A contemporary of Virgil and Horace, Propertius has influenced scores of poets--from Ovid to Housman to Pound.</p><p>His poetry appears here for the first time in a dual-language edition with the translations facing the original Latin. Rendered into English by a poet who is also one of the nation's pre-eminent Propertius experts, the volume brings Propertius's difficult mix of vernacular and high literary allusion into contemporary language.</p><p></p><p><i>Cynthia was the first. She caught me with her eyes, a fool<br></br>who had never before been touched by desires.<br></br>Love cast down my look of constant pride,<br></br>and he pressed on my head with his feet,<br></br>until he taught me to despise chaste girls,<br></br>perversely, and to live without plan.<br></br>Already, it's been a whole year that the frenzy hasn't stopped,<br></br>when, for all that, the gods are against me.</i></p>