This book is a scholarly study of a poem by the Roman poet Ovid, who lived from 43 B.C. to 17 A.D. Composed at about the same time as his more famous Metamorphoses, the Fasti is one of Ovid's lesser-known works. In this poem based on the Roman calendar, Ovid interviews gods and citizens as he investigates the origins of Rome (why did Romulus kill Remus? what happened to Julius Caesar after he was assassinated on the Ides of March?). He also discusses Roman holidays, religious customs, and religious beliefs (why do naked men run around the Palatine striking women with goat-skins on the Lupercalia? did Mars ever have an affair with Minerva? how was the constellation Orion created?).

Newlands' book is a learned and well-written discussion of Ovid's Fasti. One of the main problems that she addresses implicitly throughout her study is the problem of Ovid's political sympathies. In 8 A.D., while Ovid was still writing the Fasti, he was banished from Rome by the emperor Augustus. No one has ever discovered exactly why he was punished in this way. Scholarly debates rage over whether Ovid's tone in the Fasti, while overtly laudatory towards Augustus, might actually be subversive, subtly challenging the emperor's political establishment. Newlands does an excellent job of addressing this question through close attention to exactly how Ovid chooses to tell his tales of Rome and its history. She shows that Ovid was not rigidly following the Roman calendar as he wrote; rather, the poet selected and arranged his material carefully to create certain impressions and ideas. Newlands' title, Playing With Time, alludes to the ways in which both Ovid and Augustus managed to construct a particular shape for the Roman calendar (a record of Roman time), and thus for the historical and religious events that it commemorated. She demonstrates that even an apparently objective document like a calendar is subject to manipulation, on the one hand by a skilled poet and on the other by a powerful ruler who added his and his family members' birthdays and military victories to the roster of official Roman holidays.

This book is directed primarily at a scholarly audience, and as a graduate student, I found it extremely useful and informative. However, those who would like to learn more about Roman poetry or the Augustan Age of Rome may also find things to enjoy in this engaging study.

I was very disappointed by the Tabucchi's Dreams. The author attempts to recreate the dreams of twenty or so canonical figures from Western civilization. I felt that author made no effort to penetrate the psyche of these great human beings. The dreams were recreated by an obviously shallow reading of bio-sketches. If you want to know what I mean, select one of the characters you know very well and read his dream. I am familiar with Debussy's music and have no qualms about suggesting that Debussy's dream is a mediocre parody of his "Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun".

The same problems persist in the Last Three Days of Fernando Pessoa. This short work offended me more than the Dreams. I adore Pessoa and his poetry. It was heartbreaking to see all his heteronyms turn into colorless characters that stroll through this story. I consider Ricardo Reis to be the heteronym closest to Pessoa's personality. Unfortunately Reis comes back to the dying Pessoa to tell him that he didn't leave Portugal. Am I missing something here?? In short, any average reader of Pessoa can write a better book on the confrontations of the heteronyms with their creator.

This book is a collection of short stories of dreams of various major artists or influences on the arts - from Daedalus to Freud. It is a book that makes me wish to be more broadly educated in European literature - for when I was familiar with the biography and works of the individual, the matching of the imagined dream to the individual was more clear. For example, the dream of Federico Garcia Lorca picks up on his work regarding deepsong. Lorca is on stage singing a Gypsy song "a song about duels and orange groses, passion and death" ... A small black dog leads him towards his death as a traitor ... The dream is a wonderful mix of clarity and chaotic jumps, as are real dreams.

Tabucchi writes in his normal taut prose - with wonderful lines to mull over: "Life is indecipherable, answered Pessoa. Never ask and never believe. Everything is hidden."

But this book, unlike his other works requires significant knowledge of his reader. If you've never read Tabucchi, I would suggest that you begin with any of his other books. If you are a Tabucchi fan, this new book will not disappoint you.