A large part of our contributor's article on Lucretius is dedicated to an extended discussion of his poem De rerum natura, which we reproduce below.
The literary background to the poem
In modern times poetry has largely ceased to be a vehicle for explicit philosophical, scientific, or practical instruction, but didactic poetry – poetry that has such instruction as its explicit aim – flourished in antiquity (Gale 1994, Dalzell 1996, Toohey 1996, Volk 2002). The idea of teaching through a poem was a natural extension of the Greek conception of the poet as a conduit for divinely inspired wisdom. Hesiod (active around 700 B.C.E.) began a Greek tradition of programmatic instruction through verse with his Works and Days, in which he sets forth advice to the farmer, interspersed with broader moral teaching. The sixth-...
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Citation: Seal, Carey. "De rerum natura". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 29 December 2011 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=13409, accessed 09 June 2026.]
