This seminar considers my forthcoming translation of the poems of the Roman poet Catullus (Penguin Classics 2026) – a bilingual edition with parallel Latin and English. I will set out my main goals in tackling the Catullan collection: to offer a modern translation accessible to students, scholars and general readers alike; to match Catullus’s metrical variety and stylistic exuberance effectively in English; and to keep his obscenity as forceful in English as it is in Latin while not connecting it too neatly with modern cultural constructions of sexuality and gender. As I describe my strategies for meeting each of these goals, I will read from and elucidate my translation of several key poems, such as 6, 16, 32, 51, 60, 63, 64, 93, 94, 101, paying special attention to how careful handling of meter, style and obscenity is crucial when rendering Catullan invective. My overarching translation approach, which walks a careful line between ‘foreignisation’ and ‘domestication’, is one of constant negotiation between Catullus’s world and my own – one that I hope gives readers a clear view into an unfamiliar and distant time while also allowing them to see and to contemplate their own a bit more clearly.
Image credit: Book-cover image supplied by the author for 8 May 2026
About Classics and Ancient History Seminars
The seminars of UQ's Discipline of Classics and Ancient History are held on Fridays at 4 pm.
Their format is in person and live on online.
The physical venue for all seminars is room E302 of the historic Forgan-Smith Building (building no. 1) on UQ's St Lucia campus in Brisbane.
For the online link please contact the seminar convenor Associate Professor David M. Pritchard (d.pritchard@uq.edu.au).
Seminars 2-3 and 6-7 will be recorded for subsequent publication as open-access podcasts.
Professor Maria Wyke (Seminar 2) is the 2026 Visiting Professor of UQ's Centre for Western Civilisation.
Dr Roslyne Bell comes to Brisbane as a guest of UQ's Friends of Antiquity. She will be delivering the keynote address at the 2026 Ancient History Day on Saturday 21 March.