P. J. Davis – författare

The story of Jason and the Argonauts is one of the best known of ancient Greek myths and has captivated people for over two and a half thousand years. Focusing on Medea's attempts to resist her love for Jason, Book 7 of Valerius Flaccus' Argonautica presents one of the most attractive and engaging episodes in all of Greco-Roman epic: the key moment when Jason and Medea fall in love and when Jason, with Medea's help, yokes the king's fire-breathing bulls, sows the dragon's teeth, and compels the earthborn men to destroy themselves. Although versions of the story of the Argo's journey from Greece to the Black Sea had been told by many earlier poets, this Roman account of the myth differs from its predecessors in important ways. First, Valerius presents the Argo as the first ship and the voyage as a decisive turning point in human history: the Argo's breaking down of natural barriers will lead to interchange between human communities and to a sequence of empires, culminating of course in that of the Romans. Second, Valerius constantly foreshadows other parts of Medea's myth, most notably the explosion of violence in Corinth well known to Valerius' audience and to us from the Medea tragedies of Euripides and Seneca. Third, and most important, Valerius concentrates attention on the inner workings of Medea's mind as she fights against the combined efforts of two goddesses who ultimately compel her to betray her father and help Jason to win the golden fleece. This new edition of Argonautica 7 offers the first detailed commentary on this book of the poem in English, as well as a substantial introduction intended to be as accessible to as many readers as possible, a new Latin text, and a facing-page prose translation. The commentary is primarily literary, emphasizing Valerius' engagement with the epic tradition and with earlier treatments of the Medea story, as well as the elegance and power of his poetry, and is intended to be of use to scholars and students at all levels of study

Ovid's Heroides ('Letters from Heroines') are one of the most remarkable works of classical literature. Written towards the end of the first century BCE, they take the form of verse letters written for the most part by mythological women to the men who have mistreated them. While these letters cannot give us the voices of actual women, they are the result of a remarkable feat of imagination: they embody a male poet's attempt to represent and understand the thoughts and feelings of women in moments of crisis. Familiar from canonical works of literature, especially epic and tragedy, the heroines question the assumptions embedded in the works from which they come and offer critique of the patriarchal idea that female sexuality is problematic and needs to be subjected to male control.This volume presents an edited selection of letters written from the perspective of eight of the best-known women in Greco-Roman mythology: Briseis, Phaedra, Hypsipyle, Dido, Hermione, Deianira, Ariadne, and Medea. P. J. Davis's Introduction for the general reader pays particular attention to such matters as the poems' authenticity, their status as letters, and their relationship to other forms of Roman love elegy. The letters are presented in Latin, based on printed editions, with English translations to clarify the surface meaning of the Latin. The poems are accompanied by a detailed and accessible commentary, with all quotations from ancient Greek and modern languages being translated.