A deeply personal story of one man's life-long obsession with an ancient poet, and exploration of what Horace's thoughts on life, leisure and love can teach us today

Harry Eyres, with the help of the poetry of Horace, has written a book about some of the essential questions. He has squeezed from the life of the poet and from poems two thousand years old lessons that are fresh and relevant today. Horace and Me is a book about the love of poetry and its practical value in these troubling times. A delightful, thought-provoking book into which a lifetime of reading and musing has casually strolled Ben Okri, Booker Prize-winning author of The Famished Road Why has no one done this before? - explored themselves through their reading of a great voice from the past? What Horace wrote (about love, about wine, about happiness) can have revelatory relevance. Harry Eyres puts his lyrics in a contemporary and personal context, where he sounds fresher and more to the point than ever Hugh Johnson

Harry Eyres has been a theatre critic, wine writer, poetry editor and is currently the author of the 'Slow Lane' column in the Financial Times. He is a poet and gives regular poetry readings at venues such as the Poetry Cafe in London and has contributed to the Today programme on BBC Radio 4. He is the author of a collection of poetry, Hotel Eliseo, and of the Beginner's Guide to Plato's The Republic, Wine Dynasties of Europe, The Viking Guide to Cabernet Sauvignon Wines and the Which? Wine Guide 1995/6. He lives in London.