SOURCE: Alan E. Astin, "The De agricultura and Other Writings," in Cato the Censor, Oxford at the Clarendon Press, 1978, pp. 182-210.

Astin's Cato the Censor is the first extensive biography of Cato since Plutarch 's Lives and the only indepth study to date in English. The chapter excerpted below summarizes all of the writings, provides an extensive discussion of De agricultura, and examines Cato's development and purpose as an author. Astin ultimately deems Cato's influence on Roman prose "a considerable imaginative achievement."

1. Cato's Writings

'His eloquence lives and flourishes, enshrined in writings of every kind.'¹ If Livy has here allowed enthusiasm to outweigh precision, if his claim has too wide a sweep, the overstatement is at least understandable. The motivations and purposes which induced Cato to write, the range, the forms, the quality, even the basic nature of his compositions may all be subject to debate; but...