ARISTOFANE, (ARISTOPHANES),
Le Donne all' Assemblea. A cura di M. Vetta. Traduzione di D. Del Corno.
Fondazione Lorenzo Valla, Arnoldo Mondadori, n.p., 1989. LXX,301p. Imitation leather bound. Small stain on tail spine. Small personal library mark and name on free endpaper.
'English-speaking readers, who have the Oxford edition by R.G. Ussher, will naturally wonder whether Vetta (responsible for everything in the book, except the translation of the play into Italian prose) adds enough to justify the extra effort of reading the Italian. For specialists, at least, I think he does. (...) There are some interesting comments on the play's theme: V. agrees with those who hold that the second half of the play shows the failure of the communist system set up in the first half, and that Aristophanes' purpose is to produce an ironic parody of utopias. He considers the Lenaia of 391 to be the most likeliest date. At the end of the introduction thee is an excellent bibliography. (...) The commentary is nearly the same length as Ussher's, but differs in emphasis. V. is less helpful on linguistic details, but fuller on rhetoric and dramaturgy. (...) It will take some years of use to assess the merits of this commentary properly, but at first reading I find its quality high.' (DOUGLAS M. MACDOWELL in The Classical Review (New Series), 1991, pp.20-21). From the library of the late Sir Kenneth James Dover.
€ 22.50
(Antiquarian)