Category: Booklog
Aeneid V Pt. 1
The fifth book of the Aeneid, on the surface at least, seems an unnecessary interlude between the Carthaginian love-idyll, with its disastrous consequences, and the Trojans’ arrival in Italy. Ordinary readers would probably not notice, but a careful scrutiny reveals that it could not have been part of the original plan: Characters are introduced in the later, Italian or Iliad part of the poem, as if they had not been mentioned when in fact they play a part in this book.
View PostAeneid IV, pt. 2
Book IV really belongs to Dido. It is her mad passion for Aeneas, the consummation of their love, and her response to his decision to leave that drive the narrative.
What sort of a woman is Dido? We know she is of Phoenician royal blood, very beautiful, and while a mature woman, since she was not [...]
Aeneid IV
Aeneid IV is deservedly the most famous part of the poem. Structurally, it is placed in a strategic position, because now, at last, the narrative is ready to move forward, and the story is propelled by erotic passion. Dido is a beautiful and passionate woman, whose love for her late husband is so deep that she has sworn never to love another man or to remarry.
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Aeneid III A
If the second book of the Aeneid is a nightmare, the third books is a melancholy depiction of people who are so obsessed with the past that they cannot deal with the present, much less face the future. Aeneas has been told of his glorious mission and the destiny of his people, but all it [...]
View PostAeneid: Metrical Excursus
One serious problem facing any translator of ancient verse is the incompatibility of most English poetic meters with the meters used by ancient poets. To oversimplify a difficult and complicated problem, English meters are basically defined first by the number and sequence of stressed syllables per line, while ancient Greek verse–to take the simpler [...]
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