all scholarship for odyssey and aeneid

Fox on how Aeneas acts

Aeneas is always either insipid or odious

Williams on Aeneas being mortal

no superhuman figure, he is an ordinary mortal

Hardie on Aeneas’ roles

he is forced into a mission by circumstances beyond his control

Lyne on Aeneas’ interactions

his interactions with others is minimal

Mackie on Aeneas’ pietas

Aeneas’ general concern to facilitate fate is the cornerstone of his pietas

Gransden on Aeneas’ character

Aeneas is a complex characer, pius but also a great soldier

Ross on puppet

Aeneas is a mere emblematic automaton, a wooden puppet lacking in genuine human emotion

Pattie on not being a puppet

he is in fact free at any time to cry ‘Enough’, to decide that his mission is too hard

Quinn on Aeneas’ disgrace

Virgil ascribes the urge to kill in it ugliest form…Aeneas has surrendered to an impulse that disgraces his humanity

Sowerby on Aeneas as a loser

At the beginning he is a traumatised loser.

Sowbery on Aeneas’ own will

Aeneas survives not by his own will and enterprise but because he is the chosen instrument of divine wil

Gransden on the values of Rome

Virgil has transformed the old Homeric code into something new and wholly Roman

Williams on Aeneas in Book 12

it is Aeneas who loses in the end

Griffin on flattery

It would be absurd to supposed that Virgil embarked on an epic poem simply in order to flatter Augustus

Griffin on how to present Augustus as a military leader

Virgil hit on a brilliant solution to the Actium problem, presenting not a narration but a tableau with the central scene on Aeneas’ shield….creating a strongly symbolic image – not the shiftiness of civil war

Griffin on the story of Aeneas and Augustus

story of the foundation of Rome from Troy by a hero famous for his pietas…, the history of Rome and the deliverance of Rome achieved by Augustus

Williams on Virgils sympathy

So powerful was Virgil’s sympathy for the defeated that it often seems to conflict with the triumph of Rome’s achievement

Williams on how Aeneas was modelled

It is a great mistake to think that Aeneas was modelled on Augustus; it is rather the case that Virgil is trying to depict a character upon whom Romans of his day could model themselves

Guinach on Virgil as an admirer

admirer of the First Citizen (princeps) and his policies and sought to promote the reconstruction that Augustus had in mind

Parry on the mood of the Aeneid

a mood to the Aeneid of frustration, loss and sadness

Quinn on justifying the civil wars

if his epic was to be intellectually honest…he must make a serious attempt to justify Augustus’ conduct of the civil war

Quinn on his audience

Virgil knew his audience would read the Aeneid with another war and another man in mind

Sowerby on the customs in the Aeneid

“the Aeneid is pre-eminently a national epic intimately connected with Roman history as well as a record of traditional Roman ways and customs

Williams on the major intention

There can be no doubt that a major intention of the Aeneid was to glorify Virgil’s own country

Griffin on the key message of the poem

the cost of imperialism is high

Williams on Virgils sympathy

he sympathized deeply with private sorrow, yet he still admired the Roman national programme

Semple on war

Virgil in truth hated war

Gransden on war

Virgil expresses a profound empathy for the young men on both sides

Pattie on war

Virgil’s descriptions of violent death…are presented in such a way as to seem unacceptable

Griffin on the gods and fate

The participation of the divine \[in epic\] marks the events as truly significant

Gransden on Fate

Certain events are predetermined

Ross on the gods and fate

Fate and the gods are everywhere throughout the poem, seeming to be always in control.

Quinn on the gods and fate

the reader’s first impression is that the human action is dominated constantly by a divine machinery designed strictly in the Homeric tradition

Gransden on the gods

In the Aeneid the gods work through human wills and desires

Pattie on the inclusion of the gods in the poem

it allows him to indulge his delight in depicting scenes of fancy and imaginations to vary the more realistic passages of man’s activity

Camps on the gods and fate

The divine power in its dealings with mean appears as irresponsible and heartless

Sowerby on Anchises and Ascanius in Book 2

the patriarchal ideal of Roman society

Griffin on family relationships

There are no happy families in the Aeneid

Gransden on father figures

The Aeneid is dominated by fathers and father-figures, Aeneas is called pater as often as he is called pius

Syed on women symbolising their nations

Lavinia as the ‘proper’ Latin woman can be contrasted to the foreign, ‘wilder and chaotic’ Dido.

Oliensis on gender in the Aeneid

Virgil associates the feminine with unruly passion

Oliensis on virtuous women

The uncomplicatedly virtuous women of the epic, Creusa and Lavinia, prove their virtue precisely by submitting to the masculine plot of history

Reilly on the role of women

Virgil portrays women who step out of traditional gender roles as doomed to fail, even if they portray virtues that a Roman man should hold

Griffin on women in the Aeneid

Women are on the whole, alarming and violent creatures, prone to the making of terrible scenes

Quinn on the stories of Dido and Turnus being tragic

thus are partly but not wholly responsible for their destruction

Sowerby on Dido

the innocent victim of the Roman destiny…the sacrifice imposed by the Roman patriarchal state is most apparent in the protest of the sacrficial victim

Sowerby on Turnus

At the climax our emotional focus is sympathy for Turnus “all attention is directed to his fearful agony and all sympathy felt for him as the victim of inexorable fate”.

Callen-King on Turnus

Turnus, externally the manliest of men, is the devotee and tool of Juno and is suffering from two debilitating passons, love and anger. These facts put him squarely in the camp of the feminine

Sowerby on ira furor and lust

the emotions originating in the body are invariably a snare and a source of human misery in the Aeneid

Quinn on the hero

The episodes (in the poem) are designed to stress the inadequacy of the hero’s code

Pattie on Roman values

The Aeneid is about how Roman values superseded those of the heroic Homeric world, and more important still it is about timeless and universal problems of human behaviour – problems like the conflict between personal wishes and the compulsions of duty

Quinn on Virgil use of characterisation

to create complex characters worthy of a sympathy that can be intense but not uniform, for as the story advances our sympathy changes direction

Quinn on the poem

intensely dramatic……equally influenced by Athenian tragedy as it is by Homer

Quinn on what Virgil wanted his audience to know

to write a poem which, though modelled on Homer, was essentially different

Gransden on the true value of the Aeneid

the true value of the Aeneid lies in its transformations of Homer, in the way in which the larger themes and values of the Homeric world are modified by the ‘later’ sensibility of the Roman poet

Renshaw on the Odyssey 

the Odyssey is a story of romance, adventure, hospitality, and of justice prevailing over wickedness

Callen-king on the overall theme of the poem

Living is what matters in the Odyssey 

Griffin on Justice 

Justice, in the Odyssey, is both done and seen to be done

Jones on the oikos is central to everything 

The Odyssey makes the household…rather than the battlefield, the centre of its world

Halverson on the oikos vs nostos 

The integrity of the oikos \[household\] is..the central and dominating issue of the Odyssey,

Griffin on the Oikos 

Odysseus comes from a close and affectionate human family

Morrison on father and son importance 

An essential part of Odysseus - especially according to the Greek sense of self - is that Odysseus is the son of Laertes

Murray on the fantasy to reality 

Homer presents the return to Ithaca as a return from fantasy to reality

Goldhill on the oikos 

It is one's father's house, and his father's, in one's father's land (and his father's).

Silk on kelps and revenge 

‘Few of Homer’s modern readers would condone revenge killing… let alone acclaim it, but the Odyssey does - or does it

Morrison on the public recognition 

public actions weigh more heavily than inner feelings

Callen-King on Odyssean kleos

a new kind of kleos which recognises heroic living in various situations rather than death on the battlefield

Callen-king on the suitors 

They commit the most egregious violation of hospitality….showing themselves to be as uncivilised as the Cyclopes or the Laistrygones

Callen-King on xenia for Alcinous 

Alkinoos knows when and how to feed and entertain a guest, when to question him and when to send him off with guest gifts

Callen-king on Polyphemus’ xenia

Polyphemos, the Cyclops, mocks the norms of hospitality by giving Odysseus the “guest gift” of being eaten last

Jones on the suitors 

Reckless disregard for the bond of Xenia are enough to justify their deaths

Jones on Nausicaa

Nausicaa goes into a full xenia sequence

Jenkins on Odysseus and Penelope’s first conversation 

Penelope recognises the Odysseus in the beggar’s story to be the real man (due to the clothing description), but does not recognise the actual husband sat before her.

Morrison on Odysseus revealing his identity to the herdsmen

we see another side to Odysseus’ identity – Odysseus as lord and master of the house

Parks on Athene as a role model in Book 1 

Athene’s disguise as Mentes introduces the motif of ‘disguised identity followed by significant revelation’

Morrison on Odysseus learning from his mistakes 

There are costs to revealing your name, choosing to conceal it might have benefits

Morrison on Argus recognising Odysseus 

it is significant that while feeling pity for his lonely dog, Odysseus steels himself to conceal his emotions, something we know he must do for his disguise.

Hall on Odysseus as a colonist 

he speaks with the discerning eye of the colonist

Morrison on if Odysseus is a hero 

Odysseus achieved glory in part by underhandedness

Graziosi on whether odysseus is a villain

By turns a comic character, a tragic hero, a stoic sage and a villain

Jones on three ways to sum up Odysseus

loyal hero-husband, eternal wanderer, antihero

Jones on metis of Odysseus 

The man of “metis” is essentially a deceiver

Callen-king on the roles of Odysseus 

father, husband son and king

CM BOWRA on the stupidity of Odysseus 

His need for cunning is enforced by his own recklessness.

Manzuka on fate removing blame from Odysseus 

all had to die for reasons of fate

Parks on Odysseus’ suffering 

Odysseus’ devotion to saving his crew is highlighted through this feeling of guilt

Morrison on much enduring

that “much enduring” characteristic that adds to his heroism, fame and likability

Finley on Penelope as a key motivator in the poem 

She is a key to the unity of the poem

Griffin on Penelope like Odysseus 

By her self-command and guile, Penelope shows herself to be like him; the true wife for the hero of The Odyssey.

Griffin on fidelity 

The fidelity of Odysseus’ wife is crucial to the story, and the contrast between her and the disloyal wife of Agamemnon is repeatedly emphasised

Fagles on Od and Pen

partnership of intellectual equals

Griffin on Telemachus’ maturation 

young man in the process of achieving adult status

Jones on Telamachus learning from others 

young hero learns from what other heroes have to tell him, as much as from acting himself

Jones on the Suitors being contradictory 

they constantly think one thing and say another

Bowra on the lack of heroism in a a heroic age

the suitors are a degenerate corruption of heroes

Jones on the suitors as Aegisthus 

The Suitors, despite divine warnings, take what they have no right to in Odysseus’ palace

Morrison on Penelope’s trick with the loom

The trick doesn’t say much for the mental quickness of the Suitors.

Camps on the supernatural 

Supernatural powers are at work everywhere

Jones on the gods helping mortals as positive 

the gods help only those who are worthy of it 

Morrison on Odysseus not being reliant

Odysseus is no puppet