A. M. Juster presents a faithful, poetic translation of the elegies of Maximianus, "last of the Roman poets." This comprehensive volume includes an introduction by renowned classicist Michael Roberts, the first English translation of an additional six poems attributed to Maximianus, and the first commentary in English on the elegies since 1900.

This book is the first study to focus on a metaliterary interpretation of Maximianus’ Elegies, and aims to fill a major gap in international literature concerning the thoughts of the last love elegist on the evolution and renovation of the genre of love elegy during Late Antiquity. The book includes all known subjects of Maximianus’ poetry (e.g., the division of his work into six elegies, its attribution to Cornelius Gallus by Pomponius Gauricus in 1502, its reception in recent years, the intellectual milieu of the Ostrogothic Italy, the historical contextualization of his poetry, the Appendix Maximiani, the impact of the Augustan love elegy (and especially Ovid’s) upon it, etc.), in order to offer a more complete picture of it. However, the content of the book is predominantly prototype, as it examines subjects that have not previously been discussed in the past. These include: a) The generic interaction between the ‘host’ genre of love elegy, and several ‘guest’ genres (e.g., Roman comedy, epic, pastoral); b) The hidden metapoetic discourse regarding the genre of love elegy itself. The book is intended for scholars or students working on or interested in Roman love elegy and its generic evolution in Late Antiquity.

Latin love elegy’s flourishing concurrent with Rome’s transition from Republic to Principate has remained an issue central to scholarship on the genre since the turn of the last millennium. This book addresses the Greco-Roman literary inheritance and Augustan socio-political context that paved the way for that flourishing, while examining the genre’s key elements and characters as illustrated in the poetry of Propertius, Tibullus, Ovid, and Sulpicia. Special attention is paid to the gendered dynamics that govern the relationship between “poet-lover” (amator) and beloved and to the role of the poet as artist and creator of a “written girl” (scripta puella).