Short answers, pulled from the story.
A short biography discovered in 1961 on an Egyptian papyrus dating from at least 200 AD stands as the only ancient source containing all recorded details of Pindar's life.
Pindar was commissioned by the ruling family in Thessaly to compose his first victory ode Pythian 10 when he was about twenty years old in 498 BC.
The authorities in Thebes fined him 5,000 drachmae because such celebrations of victories against foreign invaders were not appreciated by his fellow Thebans who had sided with Persia.
Victory odes survive in just two manuscripts but incomplete collections located in many others all dating from mediaeval period.
Quintilian refers to this as a rolling flood of eloquence while Horace calls it the uncontrollable momentum of a river that has burst its banks.