With this volume, A. J. Boyle advances his apparent mission to corner the market on commentaries of the Senecan dramatic corpus – only the incomplete Phoenissae and the pseudo-Senecan Hercules Oetaeus remain. This work measures up to his previous high standards. It consists of three main parts: Introduction, Text and Translation, and Commentary, along with bibliography and indices. Taken together, B.'s edition should make Seneca's Hercules accessible and stimulating to a variety of readers.
The Introduction comprises ten sections and provides the standard background material. Those who have consulted B.'s previous work will recognise seven of them (‘I. Seneca and Rome’, ‘II. Roman Theatre’, ‘III. The Declamatory Style’, ‘IV. Seneca's Theatre of Violence’, ‘IX. Metre’ and ‘X. The Translation’) as ‘updated and recalibrated versions of the similarly numbered sections in earlier Introductions’ (xiii). Section V, ‘Seneca and Suicide’, takes the place of ‘Seneca on Anger’, found in B.'s commentaries on the Agamemnon (2020) and the Medea (2014), and of ‘Seneca on Anger and Kingship’ from the Thyestes (2017). The remaining material (‘VI. The Myth before Seneca’, ‘VII. The Play’ and ‘VIII. Reception of Seneca's Hercules’) is, of course, unique to this volume.
The first half of section VII discusses the development of ideas and motifs in each Act and Choral Ode of the Hercules, serving as a theme summary more than a plot summary. The reader is constantly directed to the Commentary for fuller and more helpful analyses. The second half traces themes — i.e. ‘Performing Virtue’, ‘The Heroic Self’, ‘Rome, Death and the End of Place’ and ‘Theatre of Rage’ — throughout the play. These global and synthetic expositions are more effective than the act-by-act examinations and potentially of greater value.
The discussion of reception in Section VIII is impressively comprehensive, being divided into ‘Antiquity’, ‘Renaissance to 1800’ and ‘After 1800’. In the latter sub-section, B. suggests that many twentieth-century renditions of the Herakles myth display ‘distinctly Senecan qualities’ (142). This may be true for theatrical productions, but B.'s inclusion of popular culture items, e.g. characters appearing in DC and Marvel Comics, Pietro Francisci's series of Hercules movies and Disney's animated film, detracts from the argument. I am not certain how the various writers and their audiences know about Greek mythology and Hercules, but I doubt these renditions are based on readings of Senecan tragedy.
The second part of the book contains the Text and Translation. These two elements complement each other to the extent that they can truly be taken as a single unit. Indeed, the lemmata in the Commentary refer to both the Latin and the English (e.g. ‘Soror Tonantis/Sister of the Thunder-god’, line 1). The text is based on Zwierlein's 1986 OCT, with some alterations. B. supplies a ‘Selective Critical Apparatus’ (252–61) and a list of departures from the OCT (262–5). Justification for the changes can be found ad loc in the Commentary. The translation is accurate and readable, written in blank verse of fixed syllable length. As much as possible, the English lines correspond to the Latin.
Next comes the centrepiece: the Commentary. Arguably, the most important and most difficult job of the commentator is to anticipate readers’ questions. B. makes his task more difficult by expanding his audience as far as possible. He claims to write for ‘drama students, [for] Latin students at every stage of the language, [and for] professional scholars of Classics, Theatre, and Comparative Literature’, among others (xii). B.'s approach to mythological issues reveals his skill at reaching his intended readers. Consider ad 86–8: ‘Eumenides’. For the less experienced and/or Latinless reader, he gives a simple identification: ‘one of the Greek names for the Furies’. For the more advanced student, he discusses how the mention of the Furies contributes to the themes of the play. And for the scholar who may want to delve deeper into the subject, he provides a list of references to the Furies in the Senecan corpus and other Latin poetry. B. also ‘aims to provide the reader with literary, mythological, political, cultural, linguistic and textual information relevant to an understanding of the play and its received form’, and ‘to elucidate the text dramatically as well as philologically’ (269). This he does, often in the same note. For example, ad 109–12, B. explicates ‘Iuno cur nondum furit/Why is Juno not raging yet’. He starts by discussing Juno's self-naming, giving examples of the device in other Senecan plays and Roman literature, in Attic tragedies and Elizabethan drama. He then discusses the significance of self-naming, before dealing with his textual decision to read furit and the length of the final vowel in Iuno (323–5). I do fear that at times the analyses may be too overwhelming for beginners, and the grammatical glosses and mythological references too basic for scholars. But both groups will appreciate B.'s efforts to explain just about everything.
Throughout, B. takes as given that the Hercules was composed for formal staging in a theatre. He provides helpful didaskalia which are always explained in the Commentary. I may disagree with some of his choices, such as the exit of Theseus after line 917; but all are based on the text and B.'s sense of Roman stagecraft. Indeed, he gives his rationale for all his interpretations, be they dramaturgical, textual or interpretive. He also includes enough material for the reader to question his conclusions and investigate further. I would certainly recommend this edition for readers at all levels, especially those interested in investigating further.
