George Buchanan: Poet and Dramatist

Educated in Scotland and France, George Buchanan became one of the most influential writers of 16th century Europe. Writing in the lingua franca of his time - Classical Latin - he was to be hailed internationally as ‘easily the prince of poets’. Here fifteen scholars, from many countries, analyse his writings, his creative use of ancient texts for contemporary purposes, and his impact on the culture of Scotland and of Europe - not least in the spheres of tragedy and music. Contents: Buchanan’s poetic achievement (Philip Ford); ‘Redundant’ epithets in Buchanan’s Pastorals (Robert Cummings); Literary metamorphosis in Buchanan’s De Sphaera (Emma Gee); The writing of memory in George Buchanan’s Iusta (Nathalie Catellani-Dufrene); Homo exsul as the lyric persona in Buchanan’s Psalms (Elwira Buszewicz); The Heavens are Telling: a Psalm-paraphrase-poem analysed (Roger Green); The historical importance of Jean Servin’s settings of Buchanan’s Psalm Paraphrases (James Porter); Buchanan’s Psalms and the musical settings by Statius Olthof (Margaret Duncumb); Buchanan’s tragedies and contemporary dramatic theory (Giacomo Cardinali); Biblical inspiration in Buchanan’s tragedies (Carine Ferradou); Buchanan and the poetics of borrowing in the Latin translation of Euripides’ Medea (Jean-Frederic Chevalier); ‘Translating’ Buchanan (Ronnie Jack); Drama out of the ‘closet’: Buchanan on stage (Jamie Reid Baxter); ‘Return, Buchanan!’ The Letter of Walter Dennistoun to George Buchanan and Buchanan’s Reply (Jack MacQueen); Dry Bones of Contention? Picking apart Buchanan’s Psalms (Roger Green); George Buchanan’s Half Millennium; (Robert Crawford).