Classics
Classics Reading List
The texts listed below are representative of the works that constitute Classics as a field of literary study: you should read them all in the original Greek and Latin before attempting the literature general examinations.
As a further guide, the texts noted in square brackets, after the phrase ‘in trans.’, are those you would find it especially helpful to have read in English translation. Please note that these texts are suggested as a helpful guide and are not intended to be regarded as required.
- Aeschylus: Oresteia [in trans.: all]
- Apollonius: Argonautica 3 [in trans.: all]
- Aristophanes: Lysistrata, Frogs [in trans.: all]
- Aristotle: Poetics [in trans.: Rhetoric, Nicomachean Ethics 1]
- Callimachus: Hymn to Pallas, Aetia fr. 1 Pfeiffer (=Prolog)
- Demosthenes: Or. 9 (Third Philippic) [in trans.: On the Crow]
- Euripides: Bacchae, Hippolytus, Medea [in trans.: Ion, Alcestis, Helen, Iphigeneia in Aulis, Cyclops]
- Herodotus: Books 1, 7, 8 [in trans.: all]
- Hesiod: Theogony 1-210, Works and Days 1-382 [in trans.: all]
- Homer: Iliad 1, 2.1-493, 3, 6, 9, 12, 16, 18, 21, 22, 24; Odyssey 1-6, 8-12, 16, 19, 21, 23-24 [in trans.: all + Homeric Hymns]
- Isocrates: Panegyricus [in trans.: Antidosis]
- Longus: Daphnis and Chloe 1-2 [in trans.: all]
- Lucian: Vera Historia 1.1-4 & 2 [in trans.: all + De Historia Scribenda]
- Lyric: Campbell’s selections of Archilochus, Tyrtaeus, Alcman, Mimnermus, Solon, Stesichorus, Sappho, Alcaeus, Anacreon, Xenophanes, Simonides, Bacchylides 17 & 18
- Lysias: 1 (On the Murder of Eratosthenes)
- Menander: Dyscolus [in trans.: Samia]
- Pindar: Olympian 1, 6, 7, 14; Pythian 1, 2, 4, 6, 8; Nemean 7 [in trans.: all Epinicia]
- Plato: Phaedrus, Symposium, Republic 10 [in trans.: Phaedo, Gorgias, Republic all, Seventh Epistle]
- Plutarch: Life of Alexander [in trans.: Coniugalia Praecepta, Quomodo Adulescens Poetas Audire Debeat]
- Sophocles: Ajax, Oedipus Rex, Oedipus at Colonus [in trans.: all]
- Theocritus: 1, 2, 7, 11, 15 [in trans.: 3-6, 22]
- Thucydides: Books 1, 2, 7 [in trans.: all]
- Xenophon: Hellenica 2, Memorabilia 2 [in trans.: Anabasis, Apology, Oeconomicus]
- Apuleius: Metamorphoses 4.28-6.24 (=‘Cupid and Psyche’) [in trans.: all]
- Augustine: Confessions 1, 8 [in trans.: 2-7]
- Caesar: Bellum Civile 1 [in trans.: all + Bellum Gallicum]
- Catullus: all
- Cicero: In Cat. 1; Pro Archia; Pro Caelio; Philippic 2; De Oratore 1.1-159, 3.120-230; selected letters (Att. 1.16, 2.19, 4.1, 4.4, 9.6a, 13.52, 14.12; Fam. 1.9, 4.5, 5.12, 8.1, 15.5, 15.6) [in trans.: Pro Sex. Roscio, In Verrem 2.4, Pro Lege Manilia, In Catilinam all, Pro Sestio, De Oratore all, De Republica 1, 6, De Officiis]
- Horace: Odes 1, 3, 4; Satires 1; ‘Ars Poetica’ [in trans.: all]
- Juvenal: 3, 6, 10 [in trans. 1-2, 4-5, 8]
- Livy: Books 1, 6, 21 [in trans.: Books 2-5, 22]
- Lucan: Book 7 [in trans.: all]
- Lucretius: Books 1, 3 [in trans.: all]
- Ovid: Amores 1; Metamorphoses 1, 8, 15; Fasti 4; Tristia 4.10 [in trans.: Ars Amatoria 1, Heroides 7, Metamorphoses all]
- Petronius: Satyricon 26-72 (=‘Cena Trimalchionis’) [in trans.: all]
- Plautus: Menaechmi [in trans.: Aulularia, Pseudolus, Rudens]
- Pliny: selected letters (1.12, 2.1, 2.20, 3.14, 3.16, 3.21, 4.19, 4.22, 5.8, 7.17, 7.24, 7.27: Sherwin- White ed.)
- Propertius: Books 1, 4
- Quintilian: Book 10
- Sallust: Bellum Catilinae [in trans.: Bellum Iugurthinum]
- Seneca: Thyestes; selected letters (51, 56, 79, 84, 86, 88, 114, 122: Summers ed.) [in trans.: Apocolocyntosis, Medea, Phaedra, [Sen.] Octavia]
- Statius: Silvae 4; Thebaid 9
- Tacitus: Annals 1-4 [in trans.: Dialogus de Oratoribus, Agricola, Annals all, Histories 1-2]
- Terence: Adelphoe [in trans.: Heautontimoroumenos, Phormio]
- Virgil: Eclogues; Georgics 4; Aeneid [in trans.: Georgics 1-3]
The following can be added as supplements to the suggestions for helpful readings in English translation:
- Chariton: Chaereas and Callirhoe
- Dio Chrysostom: Or. 12
- Augustus: Res Gestae