Prose fiction, although not always associated with classical antiquity,
flourished in the early Roman Empire, not only in realistic Latin novels
but also and indeed principally in the Greek ideal romance of love and
adventure. Enormously popular in the Renaissance, these stories have
been less familiar in later centuries. Translations of the Greek stories
were not readily available in English before B.P. Reardon's first
appeared in 1989.Nine complete stories are included here as well as ten
others, encompassing the whole range of classical themes: romance,
travel, adventure, historical fiction, and comic parody. A foreword by
J.R. Morgan examines the enormous impact this groundbreaking collection
has had on our understanding of classical thought and our concept of the
novel.