Larger than life hero Epic hero Often part God Hero goes on a long journey or quest Epic quest Begins in medias res Begins with an invocation to a muse Epic invocation ID: 611003
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The Epic Poem
Larger than life hero (Epic hero).Often part God.Hero goes on a long journey or quest (Epic quest). Begins in medias res.Begins with an invocation to a muse (Epic invocation).Includes the use of epithets.
Written in a
lofty style
.
Shows divine intervention on human affairs.
Features heroes that embody the values of the civilization.
Promotes Nationalism.
Often features the tragic hero's descent into the Underworld or Hell.Slide2
Archetype
noun1. the original pattern or model from which all things of the same kind are copied or on which they are based; a model or first form; prototype.2. (in Jungian psychology) a collectively inherited unconscious idea, pattern of thought, image, etc., universally present in individual psyches.Related formsarchetypal, archetypical, archetypic-adjectiveArchetypally-archetypically, adverbSlide3
The Epic of Gilgamesh
Author UnknownSlide4
Ancient Mesopotamia
One of the earliest known writings in the entire world.The story of Gilgamesh. A hero-king who is 2/3 God and 1/3 man.After the Gods punish and kill his best friend, Gilgamesh searches for immortality.Slide5Slide6
The Iliad
and The OdysseyAncientGreeceWritten by HomerSlide7
The Iliad
tells the story of The Trojan War.Major characters include:Achilles - The son of the military man Peleus and the sea-nymph Thetis. The most powerful warrior in The Iliad.Patroclus - Achilles’ beloved friend, companion, and advisor, Patroclus grew up alongside the great warrior in Phthia, under the guardianship of PeleusParis -A son of Priam and Hecuba and brother of Hector. Paris’s abduction of the beautiful Helen, wife of Menelaus, sparked the Trojan War.Helen - Reputed to be the most beautiful woman in the ancient world, Helen was stolen from her husband, Menelaus, and taken to Troy by ParisSlide8
The Odyssey
tells the story of Odysseus. A brave warrior trying to get home from The Trojan War.Major characters include:Odysseus - The protagonist of the Odyssey. Odysseus fought among the other Greek heroes at Troy and now struggles to return to his kingdom in Ithaca. Odysseus is the husband of Queen Penelope and the father of Prince Telemachus. Though a strong and courageous warrior, he is most renowned for his cunning. He is a favorite of the goddess Athena, who often sends him divine aid, but a bitter enemy of Poseidon, who frustrates his journey at every turn.Slide9
The Odyssey
(cont.)Telemachus - Odysseus’s son. An infant when Odysseus left for Troy, Telemachus is about twenty at the beginning of the story. His father is presumed dead. He is often aided by Athena. She assures him that his father is alive. He tries to keep suitors away from his mother until his father returns.Penelope - Wife of Odysseus and mother of Telemachus. Penelope spends her days in the palace pining for the husband who left for Troy twenty years earlier and never returned. Homer portrays her as sometimes flighty and excitable but also clever and steadfastly true to her husband.Slide10Slide11
Virgil’s
AeneidSlide12
On the Mediterranean Sea, Aeneas and his fellow Trojans flee from their home city of Troy, which has been destroyed by the Greeks. They sail for Italy, where Aeneas is destined to found Rome.
As they near their destination, a fierce storm throws them off course and lands them in Carthage. Dido, Carthage’s founder and queen, welcomes them. Aeneas relates to Dido the long and painful story of his group’s travels thus far.Aeneas tells of the sack of Troy that ended the Trojan War after ten years of Greek siege. In the final campaign, the Trojans were tricked when they accepted into their city walls a wooden horse that, unbeknownst to them, harbored several Greek soldiers in its hollow belly.Assured by the gods that a glorious future awaited him in Italy, he set sail with a fleet containing the surviving citizens of Troy. Slide13
Twice they attempted to build a new city, only to be driven away by bad omens and plagues. Harpies, creatures that are part woman and part bird, cursed them, but they also encountered friendly countrymen unexpectedly.
Impressed by Aeneas’s exploits and sympathetic to his suffering, Dido, a Phoenician princess who fled her home and founded Carthage after her brother murdered her husband, falls in love with Aeneas. They live together as lovers for a period, until the gods remind Aeneas of his duty to found a new city. Slide14
The Mahabharata
The Mahabharata is an epic narrative of the Kurukshetra War and the fates of the Kaurava and the Pandava princes. It also contains Philosopical and devotional material, such as a discussion of the four "goals of life."Slide15
The
Mahabharata is the longest known epic poem and has been described as "the longest poem ever written“the Mahabharata is roughly ten times the length of The Iliad and The Odyssey combined.W. J. Johnson has compared the importance of the Mahabharata in the context of world civilization to that of the Bible, the works of Shakespeare, the works of Homer, Greek drama, or the Qur'an.The title, translated means, “Great Epic of the Bharata Dynasty”Bharat is the Hindi word for India.Two sections of the poem are epics in there own right, and also considered sacred books in India.Slide16
The Bhagavad Gita, or Song of GodSlide17
Arjuna
asks Krishna, who has taken the form of his charioteer, to drive them into the battle. Krishna is an Avatar of the Hindu God Vishnu (“The Preserver” or “Protector”).Krishna, must not only convince Arjuna to fight, but to fight with the will to win -- to restore good, to restore balance, to fulfill his duty as a warrior. In the process of convincing him, Krishna will lay out essentially a philosophy for living, and the basic tenets of Hinduism. As the chariot moves, Arjuna sees in the two armies the equal presence of his family, for Duryodhana, despite being his enemy, is also his cousin, and thus both sides are littered with "fathers, grandfathers, teachers, brothers, uncles, grandsons, in-laws and friends." Arjuna is overcome with despair and tells Krishna that he has no desire to fight if it means killing his kin. He has no need for a kingdom if it means destroying a family. He casts away his bow and arrows and sits in the chariot in the middle of the battlefield.Slide18
The RamayanaSlide19
The epic narrates the life of Rama, the legendary prince of Kosala
Kingdom, his banishment from the kingdom by his father, his travels across forests in India with his wife Sita and brother Lakshmana, the kidnap of his wife by Ravana, the demon king of Lanka, resulting in a war with him, and Rama's eventual return to Ayodhya to be crowned king.Slide20
Rama is also an Avatar of Vishnu.
Like the Mahabharata, the Ramayana presents the teachings of ancient Hindu sages in narrative allegory.The characters Rāma, Sītā, Lakṣmaṇa, Bharata, Hanumān and Rāvaṇa are all fundamental to the cultural consciousness of India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and south-east Asian countries such as Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia and Indonesia.The poem is not seen as just a literary monument, but serves as an integral part of Hinduism, and is held in such reverence that the mere reading or hearing of it, or certain passages of it, is believed by Hindus to free them from sin and bless the reader or listener.Slide21
The Song of Roland
La Chanson de Roland is an epic poem based on the Battle of Roncevaux in 778, during the reign of Charlemagne.It is the oldest surviving major work of French literature and exists in various manuscript versions. Slide22
Charlemagne's army is fighting the Muslims in Spain. The last city standing is Saragossa, held by the Muslim king
Marsilla. Terrified of the might of Charlemagne's army of Franks, Marsilla sends out messengers to Charlemagne, promising treasure and Marsilla's conversion to Christianity if the Franks will go back to France. Charlemagne and his men are tired of fighting and decide to accept this peace offer.The bold warrior Roland nominates his stepfather Ganelon. Ganelon is enraged; he fears that he'll die in the hands of the bloodthirsty pagans and suspects that this is just Roland's intent. He has long hated and envied his stepson, and, riding back to Saragossa with the Saracen messengers, he finds an opportunity for revenge. He tells the Saracens how they could ambush the rear guard of Charlemagne's army, which will surely be led by Roland as the Franks pick their way back to Spain through the mountain passes, and helps the Saracens plan their attack.Slide23
Just as the traitor
Ganelon predicted, Roland gallantly volunteers to lead the rear guard.Pagans ambush them at Roncesvals, according to plan; the Christians are overwhelmed by their sheer numbers. Olivier asks Roland to blow on his oliphant, his horn made out of an elephant tusk, to call for help from the main body of the Frankish army. Roland proudly refuses to do so, claiming that they need no help, that the rear guard can easily take on the pagan hordes. While the Franks fight magnificently, there's no way they can continue to hold off against the Saracens, and the battle begins to turn clearly against them. Almost all his men are dead and Roland knows that it's now too late for Charlemagne and his troops to save them, but he blows his oliphant anyway, so that the emperor can see what happened to his men and avenge them. Roland blows so hard that his temples burst. He dies a glorious martyr's death, and saints and angels take his soul straight to Paradise.Slide24
The
NibelungenliedTranslated as The Song of the NibelungsThe story tells of dragon-slayer Siegfried at the court of the Burgundians, how he was murdered, and of his wife Kriemhild's revenge.Slide25
Served as source materials for Richard Wagner's
Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring of the Nibelung), a series of four music dramas popularly known as the Ring Cycle.The four parts that constitute the Ring cycle are, in sequence: Das Rheingold (The Rhinegold) Die Walküre (The Valkyrie)Siegfried Götterdämmerung (Twilight of the Gods)Imagery from the Nibelungenlied was used in many poems, essays, posters and speeches at every stage in the development of German nationalism, from the Wars of Liberation to the regime of National Socialism (Nazism).Slide26
The Song of the Cid
El Cantar de Mio Cid is the oldest preserved Castilian epic poem. Based on a true story, it tells of the Castilian hero El Cid, and takes place during the Reconquista, or reconquest of Spain from the Moors.Unlike other European medieval epics, the tone is realist.[3] There is no magic, even the apparition of archangel Gabriel (verses 404–410) happens in a dream. It also departs from historic truth is some places.Slide27
Paradise Lost
by John MiltonMilton’s speaker begins Paradise Lost by stating that his subject will be Adam and Eve’s disobedience and fall from grace. He invokes a heavenly muse and asks for help in relating his ambitious story and God’s plan for humankind. Slide28
The action begins with Satan and his fellow rebel angels who are found chained to a lake of fire in Hell. They quickly free themselves and fly to land, where they discover minerals and construct Pandemonium, which will be their meeting place. Inside Pandemonium, the rebel angels, who are now devils, debate whether they should begin another war with God.
Beezelbub suggests that they attempt to corrupt God’s beloved new creation, humankind. Satan agrees, and volunteers to go himself. Slide29
Táin
Bó CúailngeCommonly known as The Cattle Raid of Cooley or The Táin It tells of a war against Ulster by the Connacht queen Medb and her husband Ailill, who intend to steal the stud bull Donn Cuailnge, opposed only by the teenage Ulster hero
Cú
Chulainn
.Slide30
The Legend of Finn
MacCoolFionn mac Cumhaill sometimes transcribed in English as MacCool or MacCoul, was a mythical hunter-warrior of Irish mythology, occurring also in the mythologies of Scotland and the Isle of Man. The stories of Fionn and his followers the Fianna, form the Fenian Cycle much of it narrated in the voice of Fionn's son.Said to have created The Isle of MannAlso said to have created The Giant’s Causeway in Northern IrelandSlide31Slide32Slide33Slide34Slide35
The oldest surviving long poem in Old English and is commonly cited as one of the most important works of Old English literature
The author was an anonymous Anglo-Saxon poet, referred to by scholars as the "Beowulf poet"BeowulfSlide36
The poem is set in Scandinavia. Beowulf, a hero of the
Geats, comes to the aid of Hrothgar, the king of the Danes, whose mead hall in Heorot has been under attack by a monster known as Grendel.The history of modern Beowulf criticism is often said to begin with J. R. R. Tolkien, professor of Anglo-Saxon at University of Oxford, who in his 1936 lecture to the British Academy criticized his contemporaries' excessive interest in its historical implications.