Impressive dramatic work in verse. Seneca is a personality of paramount importance in both the political and literary spheres of Rome: a key advisor to Nero who attempted to curb the emperor's megalomania, an influential moral philosopher, and a writer of tragic verse that had a strong influence on Shakespeare and other dramatists of the Renaissance. His theatrical performances depict intense passionate interactions with rhetoric that is equally powerful. Their perspective is much darker than that adopted in his prose texts. His plots are based on mythical episodes, in accordance with classical tradition. However, the political realities of imperial Rome are also reflected in an obsessive concern with power and dominance over others. The "Octavia" is the only surviving historical drama from Rome: set in Nero's court, it was likely written by an admirer of Seneca as a politician and playwright. John G. Fitch has thoroughly revised the two-volume edition of Seneca's tragedies to take into account the textual and interpretative bibliography that has appeared since the original publication. His translation conveys the power of Seneca's dramatic language and the lyrical quality of his choral odes.