Book review: Simonides by Norman McBeath

Simonides by Norman McBeathEasel Press, £35

One of Norman McBeath's photographs from Simonides, accompanying Scots translations by Robert Crawford of the fragments of surviving poetry by the ancient Greek poet.

Simonides was probably the first European whose words were written to be read as text, the first to memorialise war dead in poetry, so the surviving fragments of his poetry – "bodybags'", Professor Crawford calls them – are particularly relevant to the way we think about war even two-and-a-half thousand years later.

The book, published by Easel Press (35), is linked to the 'Body Bags/Simonides' exhibition that opened this week at the Edinburgh College of Art (until 9 September) and also includes Professor Crawford's essay "Simonides and the War on Terror".