Now and Rome

'Ika Willis' brilliant analysis of the politics of territoriality in Rome and the contemporary world represents the best work in theoretically informed approaches to classics and classically informed approaches to theory. It is a masterful demonstration of how, in Derrida's words, the "very ancient" recurs in the "very modern", and an eloquent testimony to the untimely modernity of antiquity.' Miriam Leonard, Lecturer in Greek Literature and its Reception, University College London, UK -- Dr Miriam Leonard "This is an extremely important book. Not only is its scholarship impeccable it forms part of a systematic rethinking of the Classical heritage. Rather than looking to the past for either edification or consolation Ika Willis reworks the tradition by looking at the 'Romaness of now'. In so doing she makes 'Rome' part of the present. Drawing on leading figures within the European philosophical tradition she has written a work on Lucan and Vergil that allows for De Bello Ciuili, the Georgics and the Aeneid, to be read as contributing to a rethinking of the exigencies of the political today." -- Andrew Benjamin, Monash University, Australia

Dr Ika Willis is Lecturer in Reception at the University of Bristol, UK.

Acknowledgements; Introduction: Empire After Earth; 1. Aratrum (Plough) - Hannah Arendt and the Agricultural Archive; Interlude I: Fast Car; 2. Fulmen (Lightning): Paul Virilio's Politics at the Speed of Light 86; Interlude II: Romulus and Remus; 3. Hostis (Enemy): Carl Schmitt and the War of the Words; Interlude III: Templum; 4. Fas (Speakability): Jacques Derrida's Writing of Space; Interlude IV: Terminology; 5. Now: The Angel, the Boat, and the Storm in Walter Benjamin; Bibliography; Index of Passages Discussed; General Index.