Virgil’s Augustan Epic

An examination of the main characters in the Aeneid - Aeneas himself, Dido and Turnus - in the light of Virgil\'s contemporary Augustan political and literary ideology. The characters and the plot and incident of the epic are seen as embodying and exemplifying first the ancient ideals of kingship and concord, and second the Roman self-identification as at once \'Italian\' and \'Trojan\', and finally as reflecting the literary self-evaluation of the Augustan age. In the literary area, Virgil\'s relations with contemporary Roman elegy, with early Greek lyric and, most important, with Homer, are studied and reevaluated. Virgilian scholars and students of Augustan literature in general will find this book of interest to them.

Preface; 1. Divine and human kingship; 2. Kingship and the love affair of Aeneas and Dido; 3. Kingship and the conflict of Aeneas and Turnus; 4. Concord and discord; 5. Geography and nationalism; 6. Dido and the elegiac tradition; 7. Lavinia and the lyric tradition; 8. The Aeneid as Odyssey; 9. The games in Homer and Virgil; List of modern works cited; Index locorum; General index.