Thyestes

Abstract

This is an edition of an Elizabethan translation of Lucius Annaeus Seneca's play, Thyestes, written in Latin in Imperial Rome. Thus the play presented in this volume is not merely classical, but also one translated by an Elizabethan. One question that arises is how Seneca came to be of interest to the Elizabethans, another how we are to read the play as itself a Renaissance artefact, which has a good deal in common with important plays by artists like Shakespeare. In terms of their historical circumstances, their training and artistic structuring, as well as their concerns and 'world picture', Seneca and Shakespeare have many fundamental similarities.