This volume contains the first translation into English of all the major love poetry of the Renaissance neo-Latin poet Johannes Secundus and the first detailed critical appreciation of the first two books of his Elegies and the Elegiae Sollemnes.
The book consists of an introduction (on the poet's life and works, characters in and dating of the amatory elegies, literary background etc.), facing Latin text and English translation of the Elegies, brief explanatory notes and full essays of appreciation, an appendix with a translation into English of the Basia and Epithalamium, and an index.
This work contains extensive amounts of valuable information about Secundus' models, wit, style, sound, diction, placement, structure, manipulation of characters and themes, generic innovation etc. and facilitates a complete reappraisal of this major Renaissance love poet.