''Horace tells us in his poetry almost everything we need to know about his life; it is curiously entangled with the Italian earth, with the history of his times, and an exact moment in that brief early summer of Latin poetry which had no autumn.''

The work of the great Roman poet, Horatius Flaccus (65 BC to 8 BC), spanned all aspects of Roman life: politics, the arts, religion, and the authority of the emperor, while his legendary poems (Satires, Odes, Epistles) about friendship, philosophy, love and sex still have widespread appeal.

Horace: A Life presents a complete picture of Horace's life and world. It considers the details of Horace's romantic liaisons and why he never married, what the status of his father - a freed man - meant to the poet, and his distinctive brand of philosophy.

In this acclaimed biography, Peter Levi - a fellow poet - has produced a thrilling and eminently readable book, the definitive on Rome's greatest poet and the times during which he lived.