"Horace, the anglicized name of Quintus Horatius Flaccus, b. Dec. 8, 65 BC,
d. Nov. 27, 8 BC, was early imperial Rome's greatest lyric poet. He is still
widely appreciated today, both for his technical mastery and his mellow,
civilized tone. His father, a former slave who had saved his money and
cherished ambitions for his son, moved from Venusia in southern Italy to
Rome to secure the boy a better education. Later, Horace went to Athens to
obtain the equivalent of university training. The assassination of Julius Caesar
in 44 BC and subsequent civil wars swept the 20-year-old student far off course.
When the regicide Brutus addressed the Romans in Athens, Horace responded
to his call for "freedom" by enlisting in the republican army, in which he served
as tribune. The defeat of Brutus by Octavian (later Augustus) at the Battle of
Philippi (42 BC), however, immediately ended Horace's military career and
any political hopes he may have entertained. He returned abjectly to Rome where,
in the meantime, his fortunes had further suffered because of the death of his
father and the confiscation of his estate.

Starting out humbly as a public clerk, Horace spent his spare time writing poetry
and haunting literary circles, where eventually he attracted the attention of Vergil.
In 39 BC, Vergil introduced him to Maecenas, patron of the arts and the powerful
advisor to Emperor Augustus, and the ripening friendship between Horace and
Maecenas quickly secured Horace a financial freedom that enabled him to concentrate
on poetry. The country villa Maecenas gave Horace in the Sabine Hills (near modern
Tivoli) best symbolizes this independence; here the poet could escape from the congestion
and distractions of Rome to enjoy nature's tranquillity and the simple life. Many
Horatian poems explore the tensions between country and city, cultivated leisure and
activist politics or business.

For the next 30 years Horace devoted himself almost exclusively to poetry. His first
publications were two books called Satires (35 and 30 BC) and 17 shorter poems
entitled Epodes (also 30 BC). In the Satires he revived a Latin form originated a
century earlier by Lucilius and gave it a wider poetic range. Where Lucilius had been
unrestrained and often vituperative, Horace discoursed with gentle irony about faults
and foibles everyone possesses and should confront. In the Epodes he experimented
with older Greek models and meters, preparing himself for what would be his most
admired work, three books of 88 Odes (23 BC). As a lyricist, Horace is unique among
Roman poets and rare among world writers in speaking with a voice of reason that is
utterly controlled. He frequently admits to his 40 years, looks with ironic tolerance
on his and others' enthusiasms, whether amorous or political, and calls for temperate
pleasures, rejecting both extravagant passion and totally dispassionate, impersonal
preoccupation with monetary matters. Not a poet of youth, Horace instead catches
the complex problems of the middle-aged and upholds an ideal of rational contentment.

After 23 BC, Horace's interests shifted back to the discursive mode of his earlier
Satires. Exploring the possibilities of poetic moral essays, he published 20 short
Epistles (20 BC). Up to 13 BC he worked on a final book of Odes and three longer
Epistles on literary matters, the most famous of which is the Art of Poetry (c.19 BC).
The influence of Horace's poetry and personality can be seen in the essays of Montaigne,
English odes and lyrics of the Renaissance, and the didactic poems of Alexander Pope."

William S. Anderson
© 1996 Grolier Encyclopedia