In the introduction to this book Zientek and Thorne write: ‘The environments – temporal, geographical, cultural – that influence the artist and the production of his or her art are fundamentally relevant to a thorough and nuanced understanding of that art’ (p. 1). Thus, while the editors acknowledge the many important studies that have examined Lucan's connections with authors and works both preceding and following him in time, they aim to focus on Lucan and his work in relation to the time in which he lived. The volume comprises papers previously prepared for a conference that took place in 2017 at Brigham Young University titled ‘Lucan in His Contemporary Contexts’. It begins with an introduction that lays out its aim, then briefly covers topics foundational for the understanding of Lucan, such as Lucan's family history and the state of Roman education, politics and philosophy during his lifetime. It then outlines the book's layout, organised into four parts.

Part 1, ‘Lucan and Contemporary Authors and Traditions’, starts with P. Roche's examination of Lucan's work alongside Seneca's Letters. Roche identifies vocabulary and phrases that only Seneca and Lucan have in common and argues that certain pieces from Seneca's Letters can amplify meaning of certain sections of Lucan's work. Because this chapter focuses on the relationship between Seneca and Lucan, it seems quite appropriate to be positioned at the beginning. After all, Seneca was not just an uncle, but a strong contemporary influence on Lucan. Many other chapters mention Seneca and his work, so Roche lays an important foundation for that further discussion, particularly in examining the writing timelines of each author and how they might connect. In Chapter 2 T. Biggs tackles this question between Lucan and Persius. He recognises the difficulty of showing who wrote first and whether the texts are intentionally conversing, and he describes how Lucan and Persius interacted in each other's lives, how Lucan's text sometimes takes on the flavour of satire, and provides some interesting observations regarding unique phrases in common between these authors, like conpage soluta. Chapter 3, ‘Cicero, Lucan, and Rhetorical Role-play in Bellum Civile 7’ by A.M. Baertschi, shows that Lucan took inspiration from a number of genres, including declamation. Many speeches are scattered throughout the epic, but Baertschi focuses on Cicero's speech in Bellum Civile 7, encouraging Pompey to engage in battle. She shows that this speech seems quite at odds with historical information about Cicero at that time: he was not at Pharsalus to deliver such a speech, and some of Cicero's letters seem to indicate that he urged Pompey to make peace with Caesar. Baertschi argues that Lucan is engaging in rhetorical role-play that would have been understood by educated audiences of his day (p. 52): he takes the model of the suasoria to create a fictional episode inspired by writings of Cicero and has Cicero act as the voice of Pompey's soldiers and allies and advise Pompey. Baertschi clearly lays out this argument and concludes by considering the purpose of this, and how it is affected by the reception of Cicero by the time of Lucan.

Part 2, ‘The Natural World and Geography in the Neronian Period’, begins with a chapter by Zientek, ‘Mining and Morality in Lucan and Seneca’. Zientek looks to Lucan's landscapes to understand how they might reveal information about Lucan's contemporary environment and how Lucan might have been influenced by Seneca and the philosophy he reveals in works like Natural Questions. When ‘a virtuous life means living in accordance with Nature or at least not disrupting Nature's rhythms and systems’ (p. 74), civil war is a major disruption. Zientek examines mining in Lucan's text as a part of civil war, taking its toll on peoples and environments, and asserts that mining can be viewed as a transgression against the earth and a result of moral decay. She focuses on Bellum Civile 4.295–304 and a few other passages to show that Lucan is using accurate technical terminology and is in agreement with other sources on mining, especially Seneca, who sees mining as an act of violence, stemming from greed and corrupt morals. Chapter 5, ‘Even Natura Nods: Lucan's Alternative Explanations of the Syrtes (9.303–18)’ by J.C. Taylor, provides a close look at the two explanations of this unique region in the Bellum Civile and how this might fit into Lucan's civil war narrative and Stoic cosmos. In the first explanation Lucan depicts the water and land in this area vying against one another (p. 94). It was Natura's responsibility to form this part of the world, but it was left unfinished with a ‘lack of boundaries’ (p. 95), ‘leaving a fragment of primordial chaos within the world’ (p. 94). Like Lucan's narrative, this area is in conflict; so ‘it is hard not to see here a reflection of the civil war and the poem's own narrative progress’ (p. 95). The second explanation depicts water vying against sun (p. 101). Taylor shows that, with the sun gradually causing the water in the region to evaporate, the Syrtes is slowly moving closer to ekpyrosis, the Stoic destruction of the cosmos. Taylor walks readers through these two explanations, making interesting observations with the support of the scholarly literature, then considers how the Syrtes’ testing of Cato and his progress in Africa may have been linked to one of the proposed possible endings to the Bellum Civile, the suicide of Cato. Overall, Taylor helps readers navigate this part of the epic and come out of it with some worthwhile impressions. In Chapter 6, ‘World Geography, Roman History, and the Failure to Incorporate Parthia in Lucan's Bellum Civile’, M. Serena argues that Lucan uses Parthia to show that Rome missed her chance to meet her full potential as an imperial power by engaging in civil war instead of conquering the Parthians. He asserts that Pharsalus changes Rome's position in the world and that Parthia serves to symbolise this. Serena also argues that Lucan uses Horace's poetic comments on Augustus’ Parthian politics to take a stance on Nero's engagement with the Parthians. A final look at Parthia in the speeches of Pompey and Lentulus in Bellum Civile 8 ‘demonstrates the futility of all Roman attitudes toward Parthia’ (p. 124) since there is no longer a chance of an outcome without ‘negative consequences’ (p. 125).

Part 3 brings us two chapters about Cato. D.H. Kaufman explains that Lucan's Cato does not reflect actual Stoicism and that rather his portrayal ‘omits’ and ‘emphasizes’ concepts of Stoicism (p. 135) and represents instead the contemporary, popular idea of Stoicism, misconceptions included. Kaufman uses some material from Seneca to illustrate his point and provides an interesting reading of the death of Aulus in Bellum Civile 9. F. D'Alessandro Behr also examines Cato in texts of both Lucan and Seneca to show that Cato is depicted as many things, such as a sage and a soldier, but also as a benefactor willing to give his life for the Republic, a mighty horse and a beekeeper.

Part 4, ‘Back to the Future: Republic and Empire’, comprises four chapters that reflect on the Republican past in Lucan's work and how it impacts later periods, up to and including Lucan's time. In Chapter 9 J. Mebane examines how Sulla appears in the Bellum Civile and how Sulla and Marius are connected with Pompey and Caesar. She then describes the Sullan tradition in other authors throughout the Julio-Claudian period and into Lucan's time in works such as Seneca's De Clementia and back into the Bellum Civile. She concludes: ‘As long as the specter of Sulla lurks in the house of the Caesars, Rome will remain trapped in its never-ending cycle of civil bloodshed’ (p. 183). In Chapter 10 J. Weiner focuses on the scene in Bellum Civile 3 when Caesar meets the senate in the Palatine Temple of Apollo, a monument that had not yet been built, and explores other passages where Lucan mentions Apollo, Phoebus and Phaethon to consider how Lucan wields Augustan and Julio-Claudian imagery to create his story, one that differs from imperial propaganda. E.V. Mulhern writes in Chapter 11 about Lucan's nostalgia for the past and its heroes, but that Lucan can only view the past through ‘a Julio-Claudian filter that changes both its specifics and its essence’ (p. 216). She shows that Lucan and his contemporary readers can never fully go back to the nostalgic past, just as we read Lucan's text through our own filter, knowing how things ended for Lucan, Nero and the Julio-Claudians. Finally, the book ends strongly with A.M. McClellan's look at the Erictho passage and A. Mbembe's concepts from ‘Necropolitics’ (Public Culture 15 [2003]). He argues that Lucan criticises other authors’ concept of the res publica restituta by creating his own twisted symbol of it in the soldier resurrected by Erictho. McClellan concludes the chapter, and the book, with the thought that ‘Negotiating the space between life and death is symptomatic of Lucan's poetic portrait of living in a world disrupted by civil war, indeed of still living in that world’ (p. 242).

Like the title suggests, this book differs from past studies in that it focuses on how Lucan's epic is influenced by his contemporary world. Thus, readers can find much about Nero and Seneca and Stoicism; so students and scholars of these areas, in addition to those studying Lucan, will find this book to be a necessary read (in fact, Seneca seems to appear in almost every chapter, and an index lists passages of his work as well as Lucan's). These common themes help build cohesion and conversation among the chapters. Occasionally, one will find other authors like Cicero and Virgil; and this, along with the diverse range of topics, makes it seem as though there is something for everyone to enjoy in this book. Some chapters may be accessible to advanced undergraduates, but most seem to be more suited for graduate students and scholars. Alternative versions of the names of works (e.g. Bellum Civile, De Bello Ciuili, Civil War) sometimes appear, but will hardly be troublesome to the experienced. Chapters are well thought out and clear, and are accompanied by detailed notes and strong lists of references. Due to the wide range of topics not just the expected scholarship on Lucan is provided, but a variety of interesting sources. Readers will be enthralled in both the text of Lucan and the web of authors and topics surrounding it; so this book succeeds in its goal to explore Lucan's imperial world, and even beyond.