The Golden Ass of Lucius Apuleius (1924)

S$65.00

The Golden Ass of Lucius Apuleius (1924)

S$65.00

A tale of magic, and the only complete novel to have survived from ancient Rome.

Title: The Golden Ass of Lucius Apuleius

Author: Lucius Apuleius, Wiliam Adlington (trans), Philip Hagreen (illus)

Publisher: The Navarre Society, London, 1924.

Condition: Hardcover, no dust jacket. Good. Some fading to covers. Deckle edges. Interior very good. 359pp. App. 9″ by 6″.

About the book (from Wikipedia):

The Metamorphoses of Apuleius, which St. Augustine referred to as The Golden Ass (Asinus aureus), is the only Ancient Roman novel in Latin to survive in its entirety.

The protagonist of the novel is called Lucius. At the end of the novel, he is revealed to be from Madaurus, in ancient Algeria, the hometown of Apuleius himself. The plot revolves around the protagonist’s curiosity (curiositas) and insatiable desire to see and practice magic. While trying to perform a spell to transform into a bird, he is accidentally transformed into an ass. This leads to a long journey, literal and metaphorical, filled with in-set tales. He finally finds salvation through the intervention of the goddess Isis, whose cult he joins.