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Epic Poetry: Difference between revisions
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Also called Homeric or extended similes, epic similes are formal and sustained similes in which the secondary subject, or vehicle, is developed far beyond its specific points of parallel to the primary subject, or tenor, becoming the more important aesthetic object for the moment. Essentially, the epic simile is an involved, elaborated comparison imitated from Homer by Virgil, Milton, and other writers of literary epics who employed it to enhance the ceremonial quality of the epic style. An outtake from the ''Iliad'' provides an example of an epic simile: | Also called Homeric or extended similes, epic similes are formal and sustained similes in which the secondary subject, or vehicle, is developed far beyond its specific points of parallel to the primary subject, or tenor, becoming the more important aesthetic object for the moment. Essentially, the epic simile is an involved, elaborated comparison imitated from Homer by Virgil, Milton, and other writers of literary epics who employed it to enhance the ceremonial quality of the epic style. An outtake from the ''Iliad'' provides an example of an epic simile: | ||
: And swift Achilles kept on coursing Hector, nonstop | : And swift Achilles kept on coursing Hector, nonstop<br> | ||
as a hound in the mountains starts a fawn from its lair, | : as a hound in the mountains starts a fawn from its lair,<br> | ||
hunting him down the gorges, down the narrow glens | : hunting him down the gorges, down the narrow glens<br> | ||
and the fawn goes to ground, hiding deep in brush | : and the fawn goes to ground, hiding deep in brush<br> | ||
but the hound comes racing fast, nosing him out | : but the hound comes racing fast, nosing him out<br> | ||
until he lands his kill. (22.224-229) | : until he lands his kill. (22.224-229) | ||
== Epic Spirit == | == Epic Spirit == | ||
In addition to its strict use, the term epic is often applied to works which differ in many respects form this model, but manifest, suggests critic E.M.W. Tillyard in his study ''The English Epic and Its Background'', the epic spirit in the scale, the scope, and the profound human importance of their subjects; Tillyard suggests these four characteristics of the modern epic: high quality and seriousness, inclusiveness or amplitude, control and exactitude commensurate with exuberance, and an expression of the feelings of a large group of people. Similarly, Brian Wilkie has remarked in ''Romantic Poets and Epic Tradition'', that epics constitute a family, with variable physiognomic similarities, rather than a strictly definable genre. In this broad sense, Dante's ''Divine Comedy'' and Spencer's ''Faerie Queene'' are often called epics, as are works of prose fiction such as Melville's ''Moby Dick'', and Tolstoy's ''War and Peace''; Northrop Frye has described Joyce's ''Finnegans Wake'' as the “chief ironic epic of our time” (''Anatomy of Criticism'' 323). Some critics have even look to the genre of [http://litmuse.maconstate.edu/~glucas/archives/000412.shtml science fiction] — in prose and film — for the twentieth century's continuing sense of the epic spirit. | In addition to its strict use, the term epic is often applied to works which differ in many respects form this model, but manifest, suggests critic E.M.W. Tillyard in his study ''The English Epic and Its Background'', the epic spirit in the scale, the scope, and the profound human importance of their subjects; Tillyard suggests these four characteristics of the modern epic: high quality and seriousness, inclusiveness or amplitude, control and exactitude commensurate with exuberance, and an expression of the feelings of a large group of people. Similarly, Brian Wilkie has remarked in ''Romantic Poets and Epic Tradition'', that epics constitute a family, with variable physiognomic similarities, rather than a strictly definable genre. In this broad sense, Dante's ''Divine Comedy'' and Spencer's ''Faerie Queene'' are often called epics, as are works of prose fiction such as Melville's ''Moby Dick'', and Tolstoy's ''War and Peace''; Northrop Frye has described Joyce's ''Finnegans Wake'' as the “chief ironic epic of our time” (''Anatomy of Criticism'' 323). Some critics have even look to the genre of [http://litmuse.maconstate.edu/~glucas/archives/000412.shtml science fiction] — in prose and film — for the twentieth century's continuing sense of the epic spirit. | ||