This volume is the first English-language Companion to one of Latin poetry's most underappreciated talents – though, perhaps, underappreciated no more: the editors write in the introduction that ‘the publication of a Companion to Valerius indicates that this poet has achieved the status of an accepted author’ (p. 1). Students and scholars alike will be pleased to find 20 chapters which draw from, synthesise and engage with a wide array of topics – including, but not limited to, Valerius’ complicated manuscript tradition, the function of ecphrasis, the characterisation of Jason and Medea, and the poet's influence on his younger contemporaries Statius and Silius Italicus. Many of the biggest names in Flavian scholarship have contributed pieces which will serve as excellent introductions to a number of burgeoning specialised areas of study (e.g. intertextuality, metapoetics, authorial poetics and epic's engagement with philosophical ideas).

The book is divided thematically into five parts. After a brief introduction by the editors, which contains a useful summary of the epic's plot and a concise review of previous Valerian scholarship, P.R. Taylor-Briggs (Chapter 2) begins Part 1, ‘Text, Language and Poet Techniques’, by guiding readers through the complicated journey from Valerian manuscript to modern critical edition. Though much in this chapter will likely be of interest only to the specialist or the intensely curious, her concluding point – that the diligent work of textual critics is an indispensable tool for the serious literary critic – is particularly apt for a Companion in which the latter predominates. M. Barich (Chapter 3), who opens the dialogue on Valerius’ poetic techniques with a running commentary of 5.1–216, emphasises the emotive and artistic qualities of a poet so often credited with ‘political and ideological resonances’, but provides little by way of a conclusion. In his look at authorial poetics, A. Deremetz (Chapter 4) tracks Valerius’ use of storm imagery in authorial statements; H. (Chapter 5), also concerned with metapoetics, examines the phenomenon in scenes of ecphrasis. In the course of their chapters, both Deremetz and H. introduce some crucial dynamics between Valerius and his two most important models, Virgil and Apollonius Rhodius, thus laying the groundwork for the rest of the volume, and Part 4 especially.

Although Part 2, ‘Themes and Contexts’, lacks clear internal cohesion, each chapter stands well on its own merit. J.J. Clauss (Chapter 6) advocates that we see in Valerius a mythopoeic agenda which attempts to situate the Flavian dynasty in a divinely-generated universal history. The first three pages of his chapter are an excellent introduction into the concept of mythopoesis more generally. Chapters 7 and 8 are the more ‘thematic’ in this section. M. Fucecchi (Chapter 7) takes two of the poem's (apparently) contrasting themes – love and war – and shows how Valerius intertwines them in complex ways, while A. Ferenczi (Chapter 8) lays out where and how one might find strands of philosophical arguments in the Argonautica. Ferenczi's conclusions are prudently cautious: ‘any attempt to produce an ideologically integrative reading of the text inevitably leads to frustration’ (p. 153). In an excellent and all-too-brief survey, N. Bernstein (Chapter 9) avoids the debate over the Argonautica's dates in his overview of Valerius’ relationship with his Flavian milieu. He concludes that the poem's surprising – given it is a tale of travel and adventure – preoccupation with civil war must reflect the mindset and experiences of the generation that lived through the birth of the Flavian era: ‘the Argonautica’, Bernstein writes, ‘offers a grim view of the limitation of sociable co-existence’ (p. 168).

Part 3, ‘Characters’, is particularly well-balanced in its conception and satisfying in its scope. As the two most important figures, Jason (C. Castelletti, Chapter 10) and Medea (P.J. Davis, Chapter 11) together constitute half of the four chapters. Castelletti concludes that Jason is neither exemplary hero nor failure, ‘embodying the antithesis between epic exaltation and tragic pessimism’ (p. 189). Similarly, Valerius’ Medea, argues Davis, though the product of an even larger literary tradition, is an original creation. The next two chapters pair nicely as well. While H. Lovatt (Chapter 12) examines the poet's emphasis on collective thought and action among the Argonauts, R. Cowan (Chapter 13) discusses the villainous ‘tyrants’ and ‘monsters’ that oppose them. His complex analysis of tyrants is the highlight of the chapter: not only do they constitute a ‘thought experiment’ on the possibilities of right action under oppressive rule, but also ‘contribute to a self-reflexive meditation on that thought experiment itself’ (p. 233).

The longest in the volume at six chapters, Part 4, ‘Latin Intertexts’, provides a series of studies on Valerius’ intertextual relationships with his poetic predecessors and successors. Each chapter limits its focus to a single author, making this section a useful tool for students of intertextuality. These chapters appear in chronological order of intertext: Virgil (R.T. Ganiban, Chapter 14), Ovid (A. Keith, Chapter 15), Lucan (T. Stover, Chapter 16), Seneca (E. Buckley, Chapter 17), Statius (R. Parkes, Chapter 18) and Silius Italicus (A. Augoustakis, Chapter 19). Though the title ‘Latin Intertexts’ clearly precludes a chapter on Apollonius Rhodius, Valerius’ most important model is nevertheless a conspicuous absence. Perhaps most timely among these chapters are 18 and 19, which explore the Argonautica's relationships with the other two extant Flavian epic poets. Parkes (Chapter 18) recognises in the Statian epics an alignment of their own ‘belatedness’ in the Latin epic tradition with the fact that their subjects (the sons of Oedipus, Achilles) necessarily come after the Argonaut myth. Furthermore, she shows that Statius takes a ‘combative approach’ to his predecessor by obliquely correcting small details. Augoustakis, while also revealing some tendency towards correction (pp. 342–5), emphasises that Silius was determined to ‘establish his own opus as the continuation in a line of epics that narrate the exploits and glories of men from the distant mythological past to the most recent historical present’ (p. 358).

Part 5, ‘Reception’, consists of only one article by A. Zissos, who discusses a curious chapter in the Nachleben of the Argonautica: the continuation and completion of the poem in the sixteenth century by Bolognese humanist Giovan Battista Pio. Though acknowledging its many shortcomings (at times Pio was merely a mechanical and deficient translator of Apollonius Rhodius), Zissos proves Pio's ability to combine ‘inherited elements’ with his own ‘imaginative touches’ via a close reading of a particularly inspired episode: the murder of Medea's brother Absyrtus. The chapter is a fitting end to a Companion whose subject left his work so tantalisingly unfinished.

As is to be expected in a volume such as this, several of the chapters analyse the same passages – for example the proem (1.1–21), Jupiter's prophecy and announcement of his Weltenplan (1.536–56) and the description of the Temple of Sol (5.415–54). Yet rather than feel like redundant re-treading of the same ground, such repetition offers readers multiple, and often equally-valid, perspectives on the poem's most significant passages. Any reader, therefore, who takes the time to read the volume carefully from cover to cover will be rewarded with a well-rounded understanding of the poem. Brill has given students and scholars a valuable point of entry into current trends and debates surrounding both the Argonautica itself and its place in the continuum of Roman poetry.