Cambridge medieval classics ;

The autobiographical poems of Gregory of Nazianzus, fourth-century Father of the Greek Church, are remarkable not only for a highly individual picture of the Byzantine world but also for moments that are intimate, passionate and moving. This book contains Greek text and facing English translation of a selection from his one hundred or so surviving poems. Gregory is best known for the five orations he gave in Constantinople but, De Vita Sua apart, his poems can only be read in a nineteenth-century Greek edition and have never before been translated into English. The selected poems highlight Gregory's spiritual outlook and also his poetics; Gregory shows his expertise in a variety of metres and literary dialects, deriving from his knowledge of classical Greek literature. The substantial introduction provides biographical information against which to set the poems, focusing particularly on the years which Gregory spent in Constantinople.

The Monarchia, Dante's treatise on political theory, addresses the fundamental question of what form of political organization best suits human nature; it embodies a political vision of startling originality and power, and illuminates the intellectual interests and achievements of one of the world's great poets. The whole text is here presented in a new English translation, the first for forty years, based on a more up-to-date and scholarly version of the Latin original than has previously been available. The translation, together with accompanying introduction and notes, has been prepared by Dante scholar Prue Shaw. In this new accessible form, the Monarchia will interest not only Dante specialists, but also students of literary studies, political history and philosophy.