Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BCE) was one of the most influential figures in late republican Rome, a moment of great social, political and cultural unrest that would lead to the transition from republic to empire. He was a statesman, an orator, a philosopher and a poet. And his voluminous surviving letters provide a window on his more private thoughts and the nature of his relationships with family and friends. 

In “Cicero: A Very Short Introduction,” Yelena Baraz presents a concise and engaging portrait of Cicero’s life and accomplishments, showing him as a mediating figure: between theory and practice, philosophy and politics, Greek and Roman, and among political interest groups. 

SPEAKER 

Yelena Baraz specializes in Latin literature, Roman cultural history and the history of ideas. She is the author of “A Written Republic: Cicero’s Philosophical Politics” (2012), “Reading Roman Pride” (2020), “Cicero: A Very Short Introduction” (2026), and has published widely on major Latin authors. She is completing a new translation of Ovid’s “Metamorphoses” for Modern Library together with the acclaimed author and translator Jhumpa Lahiri. 

Baraz joined Princeton’s Department of Classics in 2007. She was appointed the Kennedy Foundation Professor of Latin Language and Literature in 2019 and, since 2023, has served as Director of the Princeton Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts. 

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