Introduction

Map



The Aeneid is an epic poem of great significance in Western literature. It tells the story of Aeneas, a Trojan hero, and his journey to found a new civilization in Italy. This work not only showcases the heroic deeds and adventures of Aeneas but also explores themes such as fate, duty, and the relationship between the gods and mortals. The map provided helps readers better visualize the geographical locations and routes mentioned in the poem, enhancing their understanding of the story.




--The Aeneid



Translator's Postscript

Genealogy: The Royal Houses of Greece and Troy

Suggestions for Further Reading

Variants from the Oxford Classical Text

Notes on the Translation

Pronouncing Glossary




The translator's postscript offers valuable insights into the translation process, including the translator's approach, challenges faced, and decisions made. The genealogy section provides a detailed overview of the royal houses of Greece and Troy, which is essential for understanding the complex web of relationships and family ties in the poem. The suggestions for further reading guide readers who wish to explore related topics or other works by Virgil. The variants from the Oxford Classical Text present different readings and interpretations, allowing for a more in-depth study of the text. The notes on the translation clarify difficult words, phrases, and cultural references, while the pronouncing glossary helps readers correctly pronounce the names and terms in the poem.

The Aeneid by Virgil
(70BC – 19BC)
A verse translation by Allen Mandelbaum

Virgil selects the “Iliad” by Homer as the foundation and backdrop for his epic poem, The Aeneid. Scholars believe that Virgil's intention with this work was to establish the original founding of the Roman Nation. Ilium is the Latin name for Troy, a city that existed in the late bronze age, around 1200BC. The Iliad tells the story of the young Trojan Paris and his abduction of the willing and beautiful Helen, followed by the Greek revenge expedition led by kings Menelaus and Agamemnon, a ten-year siege, and the ultimate destruction of the city.

Virgil began working on the Aeneid late in his life, around the age of 41, and continued for the last eleven years of his life. Readers of the Iliad will recall the final image of the long war, the sudden outcome due to the trick of the wooden horse, the destruction of Troy, the annihilation of King Priam and his family, and most of the city's inhabitants. Only Aeneas and a frightened group of followers managed to flee and escape. This is the starting point of Virgil's epic work.

Aeneas had his young son Ascanius by the hand, carried his old father, Anchises on his back, and left his wife Creüsa behind. Unfortunately, on the way, she got lost. Aeneas turned back in pain and despair to search for her but to no avail. Soon, Aeneas was surrounded by a large crowd of fleeing Trojans. They built ships and took to the sea in search of a new country where they could establish themselves.

Now, all the Ancient Gods in Olympus prepared to interfere and did not hesitate to appear in disguise, giving Aeneas instructions on where to go and how to fulfill their destiny. After many rough adventures, inspired by Homer’s Odyssey, on the sea and coastlines, Aeneas lost his father in old age on the way. Apollos priestess, the Sybil, shows him the way to the land of shadows, the underground, to help him see his father again. Aeneas succeeds and then returns safely to the ground.

Finally, by the decision of the Gods, their ships are cast up on the sands of Libya. Here, the most famous and pleasant romantic chapter occurs as Aeneas encounters Queen Dido of Libya. Dido is a lovely young widow who quickly falls in love with Aeneas and makes him her lover and new husband. However, she is soon left heartbroken when the Gods interfere again and make the Trojans continue their journey to destiny, to find a new country in Italy, the Latium.

After seven years of extensive and dangerous wanderings, Aeneas and the Trojans arrive in Italy at the mouth of the Tiber River. They set up a base camp and go to meet old King Latinus at his fortress of Laventum to ask for permission to settle there. The king is in favor and even offers his daughter Lavinia to Aeneas for marriage, but Turnus, his son, is jealous. Angry young Turnus organizes a war of raging Latins against the Trojans. The Gods have their favorites on both sides.

This chapter of the war is a long remake in reverse of Homer’s battle in the Iliad before the walls of Troy. Virgil, almost word for word, uses the same style and sequences as Homer in the fight between Hector and Achilles. Throughout his work, Virgil, like a mirror, stays close to Homer’s pictures of fight and war, as well as in human relations among the fighters, their loyalties, hopes, fears, and bravery. And besides personal feelings, their unfailing faith and loyalty for political engagements given and received.

In a final long and furious battle between Aeneous and Turnus, the Gods decide the outcome. Aeneas lives, but by the will of Jupiter, in exchange, the Trojans lose their name in the future civilization. Italy remains Italy, and the future generations based on Trojan bloodlines become Romans.

I was charmed by my first encounter with the Aeneid in a prose translation. The story still remains in my mind, with most of its twists and turns. To me, the verse translation by Allan Mandelbaum is a far superior pleasure to read. A milestone in classic literature, ‘The Aeneid’ is a Must for readers of classics.

I'm a huge fan of propaganda, but I think I might not be a fan of fan fic. I went into this hoping it would be fun, extreme, Latin propaganda. However, The Aeneid is really more like Trojan War fan fic, in my opinion. It's like The Phantom Menace to The Iliad's Empire Strikes Back. It's seriously lame.

I think Akira Kurosawa could have made a decent movie out of it because he likes to have people in a frenzy. There's a lot of that here. The dudes are all chest-pounding, talking about blood, and the chicks are all hair-pulling, in a frenzy, and wailing. And Aeneas is such a dweeb when it comes to name-dropping. Like, "Oh, did I mention that Venus is my mom? Oh, did I tell you how hot I am? Yeah, I was there when Odysseus tricked the Cyclops." Give me a break. Did you really trick the Cyclops? No. Get over yourself.

This is what happens when you start a series and someone else wants to cash in on your story. It's like the fifth season of The West Wing or the seventh season of The Gilmore Girls or all those Jane Austen/Jane Eyre sequels and prequels. It just doesn't work. Find your own story! I'm looking at you, Virgil.

Not that I'm against people using storylines that someone else has used. That's almost inevitable (and, of course, Shakespeare is a good example of it being okay to steal). But there is a line. I'm not sure where it is, but this story crossed it. And don't even get me started on Dante. Why? Virgil's got his guys running into Homer's guys, and then Dante's running into Virgil? It's so presumptuous.

I guess it's like this: you can steal a great storyline if you have something to add to it. But don't think your super lame storyline will suddenly become wonderful just because you drop a character from a good story into it.

And there are some really weird details in this story. For example, Venus is this guy's mom, but she doesn't raise him to know not to be like George Costanza and run away from the Greeks? Dude. It just takes a second to wait for your wife, you loser. I mean, I'm not a big fan of Venus to begin with, but that's just weird. It seems like she would have taken a minute to say, "Don't trample people when you're running away from your enemies." Maybe it never occurred to her he'd be so lame.

And then the thing with Dido was just annoying. She's the queen of all the land, has been through hell, with her evil brother killing her seemingly awesome husband. And then when Aeneas says to Dido, "By the way, it was great sleeping with you, but I have a lot of heads to chop off for no reason, so I should probably get going," she goes all Kathy Bates in Misery all of a sudden. Except lamer because she's wailing and self-mutilating instead of taking it out on him. It's just awkward to watch. Girl needs a sassy gay friend. And none of these people are as cool as they think they are.

And the rest of the book is basically one long chest-pounding session. I guess there's the part where he goes to Hades and, lo and behold, he knows people there. I'm kind of bitter about the whole thing because Juno is so funny and great in The Iliad and such a loser here. Again, Akira Kurosawa probably could have turned it into a decent movie. I don't really get the frenzying thing, but Kurosawa seemed to like it. And if you like people running around, chopping limbs off and then whining and blustering for a while, you might really like this book. But what I'm saying is that if you haven't read The Iliad, that's where it's at. I recommend reading it in a hammock for the best results.

The Aeneid is a remarkable book that offers a unique reading experience.

I read the first 6 out of 12 sections of the book within 3 weeks and then didn't touch it for almost a month. Later, I read the remaining 6 sections in about a week. In this review, I will share my experiences rather than just the book itself because the Aeneid is a book that is better lived than described.

Before reading the Aeneid, it is necessary to read the Iliad and the Odyssey. The Aeneid begins with the fall of Troy and the escape from there, and throughout the book, there are references to Troy. The Aeneid consists of 12 sections in total. The first 6 sections are written like the Odyssey, and the latter 6 sections are like the Iliad. You can feel this very clearly when reading. It is an incredible experience in itself. If you can manage to read the first 6 sections, the remaining 6 sections will be much easier to read. It is impossible for someone who has not read the Iliad and the Odyssey to understand this book.

It is very important to get acquainted with Greek mythology by reading the Iliad and the Odyssey. When reading the Aeneid, you need to put aside everything you have learned about Greek mythology and write the version according to Roman mythology. Some people and stories will appear in a completely different format, so be prepared.

The first two sections of the book beautifully describe the Trojan War, and in the section related to Dido, we hear a wonderful female voice. This was one of the things that impressed me the most about the book. When reading the text, I felt as if I was listening to a woman. The personifications of the goddesses were also very good.

Don't try to understand every line, every person, and every story in the book. Just be content with what you can understand.

What makes the book difficult to understand is that it is a work that forms the basis of the construction of values that have had and will have an impact for centuries, such as Roman mythology, Roman culture, and Roman society. It is not just any text written in the form of a poem that is the plot of the book. I focused on how this construction was done in the book, and the story and characters were in the background for me in this sense.

To understand this book, there must be a separate book or at least a detailed preface. People, stories, references, and myths must be described in a very detailed way. Its Turkish translation is not difficult in terms of language meaning, but there are many things that are not understood in terms of content, and this lack of information makes it difficult to read. Sometimes you can't understand most of what you read because of this.

At the end of the book, a dictionary has been made for the Aeneid, which is very well thought out, but the information in the dictionary is very superficial and does not cover everything and everyone. For example, there are two important characters in the book, Marcellus and Pallas. These two people are not in the dictionary. You need to look up on the Internet who they are. Moreover, Pallas is also the first name of Athena, and the fact that it is confused with this creates a great deal of confusion in meaning. Unfortunately, there is not even a short footnote where the story takes place.

For the Iliad and the Odyssey, Azra Erhat's carefully prepared preface and mythology dictionary made it possible to understand the books better, so I looked for something similar for the Aeneid. I had difficulty because I couldn't refer to such a guide book throughout the entire book. Still, it was an incredible experience, and I'm glad I read it.

I’ve been longing to read the Aeneid for numerous years. The Armorial Bearings of the City of Melbourne bear the motto: Vires Acquirit Eundo, which is sourced from book four of the Aeneid. It means, “It gathers strength as it goes”. Melbourne’s first judge bestowed this motto upon the young town. However, I’ve often pondered if those to whom he gave it were aware that the reference pertains to sexual rumours circulating about Dido and Aeneas. Rumour being the swiftest of the Gods.

There is a pop star named Dido as well, which I find to be an odd name for a child. Given Dido’s tragic fate in this book - to commit suicide as Aeneas abandons her to fulfill his destiny and found Rome - it seems an even stranger choice.

I was completely unaware that Aeneas was from Troy. Helen has a great deal to answer for. But then again, what would the Iliad, Odyssey, and Aeneid be without her? And while on the topic of troublesome women, what is Juno like? But then, if one marries one’s brother...

The religion in this book is truly remarkable. I rather like it as it more or less aligns with my perception of the world. One of the challenges Christianity faces is the problem of evil - how can an all-powerful, all-loving God permit such terrible events to occur? But the ancients had no such concerns. Basically, the Gods are all completely crazy and dysfunctional. They not only engage in incest but also every conceivable vice and they all essentially despise each other. So they deliberately make life a misery for one another and, in the process, make life a complete misery for people.

For instance, imagine that not only the destruction of Troy but also that of Carthage (two major cities of the ancient world) can be more or less attributed to a guy named Paris judging a beauty contest. This is religion for the third millennium. This is religion for a generation raised on Big Brother and American Idol.

When Virgil gets violent, it is graphically so. You know the kind of thing - thrice the two-edged sword hacked into his flesh until huge welts... Yes, it's boy's own adventure stuff, perhaps even with capital letters. There's a lot of blood, quite a bit of mashed brains, and the words 'up to the hilt' are used at least twice that I can recall without checking.

Nonetheless, there are moments of profound humanity and a perceptiveness that takes one's breath away. The scene in hell with Dido is very touching, and the story with the king of Arcadia and Pallas is heart-rending. A recurring theme throughout is how one's greatest victory can turn into one's greatest defeat - as Turnus demonstrates at the end.

I truly adored this. I loved the extended metaphors (some that bordered on being overly extended - like a rubber band that suddenly snaps and hits the person stretching it on the hand when all they wanted was to shoot the band at a friend across the room or knock down some paper targets now forever out of reach). There was one - which I've forgotten what it was trying to illustrate - where a lion was being baited and had a spear stuck into it and the spear was broken off flush with its wound. I think it was all to say how loudly some guy was roaring - you know, as loud as a lion wasn't quite sufficient. But the metaphors are really something special. You'd never be able to get away with constructing metaphors like that today.

I don't know if it's as good as the Odyssey, but like the Odyssey, it begins as a Classical Road movie and ends up as one of those Epic Theatre battles that used to be on TV after the wrestling on Sunday mornings when I was growing up.

You have to admit one thing about these Mediterranean types, they really know how to put on a good fight. The hardest thing to understand is that the Romans gave up all this to become Christians - it's hard to fathom.

YouTube kanalımda İtalyan Edebiyatı'na başlangıç yapabileceğiniz kitap önerilerimden bahsettim: https://youtu.be/nTxrw0TosEg

The ever-discussed Aeneas. Aeneas with his burdens on his back. Aeneas, who takes everything into account for his goals and doesn't turn a deaf ear to the dogs that come his way. Who is this Aeneas really?

There is an Aeneas in everyone. It is an Aeneas who feels as if he has been expelled from his homeland and looks at people with a sense of homelessness when he walks outside. He has goals and has taken many things into account to achieve them. He has the burdens he carries on his back. We recognize Aeneas by his characteristics such as worry about the future, not being able to be hit or miss, not being able to forget, not being able to get used to, and being in the deadly consciousness of the age he lives in.

There are 2 sentences that Aeneas says to everything that comes his way in life:

"Endure, resist.
Struggle for a better future.
Aeneas said this, with hope on his worried face." (p. 33)

Struggling for a better future with hope and resistance. Enduring and not giving up in the face of failures. Being able to move forward steadily towards your goals without paying attention to those who talk behind you. It is about trying, losing, and being able to dedicate your life to your goals in this cycle continuously. Aeneas does not engage in idle things and idle conversations.

Aeneas has a burden on his back. Even if this is his father as a support, we all also have various burdens on our backs. And there are many obstacles that come in Aeneas's way as he carries this burden. People constantly talk behind Aeneas. Aeneas is criticized not for what he does but for what he doesn't do. He is one of the few people in his age who can be as real as he can present his goals tangibly and visibly. Besides this, most people don't believe in his search for founding a new country...

What is the real search for founding a new country? Is the country we are exposed to only a geographical country that is around us and whose borders are surrounded by land and sea? My country has a geography that thinks with its intellectual climate and flourishes with its individual solution vegetation. Its cities are issues that cannot be left indifferent. It is a country that has never had good relations with foreign policies. Because there the fruits grow, and the people of Aeneas do what they can for them continuously. They throw the tree that bears fruit, and that's exactly why those who are jealous of Aeneas also take the stones into their hands and start to stone his searches, the responsibilities on his back, his search for a new country, his travels in the country of the dead...

The enemies that Aeneas fights on the walls are passed off as the Rutulians who are jealous of what Aeneas has done in the support. But in reality, Aeneas fights with jealousy, with egos, with being hit or miss, with being apolitical, with aimlessness. He shoots an arrow, he wounds the head of an indifference. He throws his spear, and one of the aimless ones has fallen to the ground. Even sometimes the spiritual burden he carries helps Aeneas, and the divinity of one of those burdens becomes a shield against jealousy. No weapon is ineffective for Aeneas. Because there are valuable people who support Aeneas.

Instead of explaining Greek and Roman mythology here with unknown words, there are very valuable sentences that Aeneas said to us. Enduring, resisting, struggling for a beautiful future. Not putting stones in the way of those who endure, resist, and struggle for a beautiful future. Taking an example from the good side of jealousy and trying to lighten Aeneas's burden. Not looking at the deficiencies of the age he is in and always having the energy needed to found new countries together. After all, he said something again:

"Don't stop your effort, continue what you started, don't shy away from working."
(p. 84)

Continue what you have started, don't stop your effort. No matter what anyone says behind you, you are again and only the person who can cause the future in front of you to be beautiful. Those who talk from behind stay behind, but there is a more beautiful future ahead, because gossip and jealousy are a dry talk crowd, being characterless, while the essential thing is to be able to put character, to be able to run with all one's might to carry all the burdens on one's back in an age when no one has taken a step to carry a burden.

Drive away thought and the sword of effort towards them, Aeneas! Never stop your effort. Go to the country of the dead, to Hades there. Don't forget the silhouettes of the innocent people who are now dead. They will be your guide on this journey, like Pallas Athena. Even their shadows will be enough for you. Even Heinrich Böll, one of the writers of destruction, said:

"I believe that the living are dead and that the dead have lived."

That's it, this was Aeneas's guide. Aeneas also lived with the dead. The great-hearted man who took his strength from God and carried his burden on his back. When he realizes that most of the people around him are dead, Aeneas will make more effort to keep his name and what he has done for his people alive after he dies. Because we all long to see a piece of hope on our worried faces. We are all looking for a resistance and a support in our virtual lives. The fetters we put on virtual realities and then our enslavements for that are taking away the essential Aeneas search in us.

There is only one thing that Aeneas said, endure, resist, struggle for a better future. Do you know? We don't really need too much...

Aeneas of Troy, as described in Homer’s Iliad, manages to survive the Trojan War that claims the lives of most of his fellow-countrymen. He is a warrior of remarkable skill and bravery. However, in Book 20 of the Iliad, he is on the verge of being killed by Achilles. But then, the sea-god Poseidon intervenes. Poseidon “poured a mist across Achilles’ eyes…and hoisting Aeneas off the earth he slung him far…” At this point, Aeneas simply vanishes from the poem. According to the Roman poet Virgil, Aeneas’ disappearance can be attributed to his destiny to lead a group of fellow Trojan survivors in founding a new and greater Troy, in the form of mighty Rome.

Virgil (70-19 B.C.) holds a unique position among the poets of classical Rome, much like Homer among the Greeks. No other classical writer in Latin is believed to possess Virgil’s ability to handle the language in a way that results in work that is both powerful and elegant. His poetic talent was recognized and encouraged from a young age. At the same time, given the era in which he lived, Virgil was inevitably drawn into the turmoil of Roman politics as Rome transitioned from a republic to an empire, facing one crisis after another.
He is said to have been born near present-day Mantua, in northern Italy. In 42 B.C., after Octavian defeated Brutus and Cassius at Philippi, he rewarded his soldiers with land confiscated from local landowners. One of these landowners might have been the then-28-year-old Virgil. Some scholars believe that Virgil’s Eclogues contain pointed references to Octavian’s act of land theft.
Yet, even if Virgil resented what Octavian did in northern Italy, he must have known where his interests lay. Within five years, he became part of the entourage of Maecenas, a trusted advisor to Octavian and a patron of poets. Maecenas encouraged Virgil to compose the Georgics. This poetic cycle further enhanced Virgil’s reputation for poetry. It is said that Virgil and Maecenas read the Georgics to Octavian after his return from defeating Antony and Cleopatra at the Battle of Actium in 31 B.C.
It must be wonderful – it truly must be wonderful – to have a future emperor on your side. The poet Propertius tells us that Octavian, after officially becoming the first Emperor of Rome as Augustus Caesar, commissioned Virgil to write the Aeneid. This allowed the poet to spend the last decade of his life working on the epic poem that would forever be regarded as his masterpiece. Reading the Aeneid, one can sense how Virgil builds upon the Homeric tradition and, in some respects, alters it by incorporating a contemporary political nuance that no doubt pleased his imperial patron.
There are numerous excellent translations of the Aeneid. I prefer the Penguin Classics deluxe-edition translation by Robert Fagles. A classics professor at Princeton University, Fagles had a talent for translating the Greek of Homer and the Latin of Virgil into powerful, evocative English. His translation is in a Shakespearean-sounding blank-verse iambic pentameter that captures the musicality of both poets while avoiding both pedantry and excessive informality. His work found a wide and appreciative audience, and rightfully so.
Fagles begins his translation of The Aeneid with the words, “Wars and a man I sing” (p. 71) – not the traditional “Of arms and the man I sing” – and in a way, I like Fagles’s version better. The reason is that his translation – “a” rather than “the” – emphasizes Aeneas as a specific individual with a destined historical role, which seems to align well with Virgil’s historical vision and poetic sensibility. After all, Aeneas is “an exile driven on by Fate…destined to reach Lavinian shores and Italian soil”, and to face “many losses…in battle…before he could found a city” (p. 71) at what would one day be Rome.
The world of The Aeneid, like that of The Iliad and The Odyssey, is a world where the Olympian gods frequently and forcefully intervene in human affairs. Jupiter himself, the king of the gods, has made it clear that it is Aeneas’ ultimate destiny to defeat any enemies he may encounter in Italy and to found the Roman state.
Aeneas faces the constant and unyielding opposition of Juno, the queen of the gods, whose hatred for the Trojans persists even after the destruction of Troy. However, he enjoys the protection of other Olympian deities, such as Venus (the goddess of love and Aeneas’ mother) and the sea-god Neptune. When Juno persuades the wind-god Aeolus to send wild winds to strike the Trojan ships at sea, endangering the entire Trojan expedition to Italy, Neptune, accompanied by his son Triton and the sea-nymph Cymothoë, calms the seas and rescues the Trojans. Virgil describes this event through an elaborate simile that emphasizes the Roman “rage for order” and fear of chaos.
Driven to Carthage, the Trojans are granted sanctuary by the Carthaginian queen Dido. After hearing Aeneas’ account of the Trojans’ hardships during and after the fall of their city, she remarks, “Schooled in suffering, now I learn to comfort/Those who suffer too” (p. 97). While Virgil portrays Venus as causing Dido to fall in love with Aeneas by having the love-god Cupid shoot Dido with arrows of love, in accordance with a well-known trope of classical epic, this hardly seems necessary. It makes perfect sense that Dido, like Aeneas, an exile who has successfully led her people to safety in a new land, might develop passionate feelings for someone who is brave and strong like her and with whom she has so much in common.
In Book Two of the Aeneid, Aeneas provides Dido and the Carthaginian court with a detailed account of the fall of Troy. He emphasizes the treachery of the Greeks in achieving victory through the ruse of the Trojan Horse. Aeneas recalls how Laocoön, the priest of Troy, attempted to dissuade the Trojans from bringing the horse into the city, saying, “Trojans, never trust that horse. Whatever it is,/I fear the Greeks, especially bearing gifts” (p. 105).
“Beware of Greeks bearing gifts” – another idea from Virgil that is often heard in the modern world, even by those who have never read Virgil. However, as Aeneas reminds us, the Trojans did not heed Laocoön’s advice. This is because two giant sea-serpents, sent by the gods, swam ashore and promptly killed Laocoön and his two sons – a scene that can be seen recreated in a magnificent and grim statue preserved today at the Vatican Museum. We are constantly reminded that the Olympian gods are fully capable and willing to intervene in human affairs in a manner that we mortals might consider fundamentally unjust.
As Aeneas tells it, he was prepared to sacrifice his life in the defense of Troy until his mother Venus intervened and told him to focus on saving his wife Creusa, their son Ascanius, and his father Anchises. Venus also made it clear that there was no point in Aeneas continuing to fight for Troy, a city whose fall had been ordained by the gods. And so, Aeneas left Troy, carrying his father Anchises on his back and holding the hand of his young son Ascanius. His wife Creusa followed behind, but her ultimate fate was a tragic one.
This part of the Aeneid, with its emphasis on how the gods arrange the love affair between Aeneas and Dido – even using the weather to trap the two together, alone in a cave, at a crucial moment – creates a strong sense of sympathy for Dido. There is a desperate quality to Dido’s love for Aeneas.
Their love is passionate, and it is no wonder that more than a dozen composers have been inspired to bring the story of Dido and Aeneas to the operatic stage. Understandably, Aeneas is in no rush to leave his Queen of Carthage. It takes a visit from the messenger-god Mercury to Aeneas to persuade the prince of Troy to abandon his Carthaginian love affair and return to fulfilling his divinely appointed duty. Mercury may offer a rather sexist assessment that “Woman’s a thing/That’s always changing, shifting like the wind” (p. 190), but one can sense how much Virgil sympathizes with Dido.
Aeneas obeys the gods’ directive and departs. Dido curses her departed lover, predicting eternal enmity between Carthage and Rome – a prophecy that anticipates the three Punic Wars of 246-164 B.C. and the total destruction of Carthage – and then takes her own life.
It soon becomes evident that Aeneas will not be able to complete his quest and fulfill his destiny unless he descends into the underworld, the realm of Pluto and the abode of the dead, to receive crucial information from his now-dead father Anchises on how to proceed with the rest of his mission. In passages of extraordinary grimness, Virgil presents a vivid picture of the underworld, with particular emphasis on the cruel punishments awaiting those who have sinned against the gods.
These passages from Book 6 of the Aeneid are said to have caused Augustus’ sister Octavia to faint when the poem was read to her. Centuries later, they inspired the poet Dante Aligheri. In the first two books of his Divine Comedy, Dante the Poet makes Virgil the guide for Dante the Pilgrim through Hell and Purgatory. Anyone who has read the Aeneid will immediately see how strongly Virgil’s poem influenced Dante’s vision of Hell in the Inferno.
Like Odysseus in the Odyssey, Aeneas in the Aeneid successfully navigates the underworld and finds his father Anchises. Anchises gives him advice on how things will unfold, looking ahead to the Roman Empire and the Roman “destiny” to rule the world.
Armed with this new knowledge, Aeneas returns to the world of the living and sets out to fulfill his destiny. While Latinus, the king of the Latins, is willing to follow the gods’ wishes, form an alliance with the Trojans, and marry his daughter Lavinia to Aeneas, there are still some formidable opponents to be faced. Turnus, the king of the Rutuli, was the man whom Latinus’ wife Amata wanted to marry Lavinia. He is furious at the prospect of losing both his bride-to-be and his potential future kingdom to a newcomer from defeated Troy. Turnus, “his build magnificent, sword brandished,/Marches among his captains, topping all by a head” (p. 300), is likely to be a formidable adversary for any warrior. And among Turnus’ greatest supporters is the Volscian leader Camilla, “This warrior girl, with her young hands untrained/For Minerva’s spools and baskets filled with wool,/A virgin seasoned to bear the rough work of battle” (p. 301).
Virgil has a gift for interweaving elements of sharp characterization, even in the midst of bloody battle scenes. One of the prominent villains in The Aeneid is Mezentius, an Etruscan king known for his cruelty. He delights in the opportunity to spill Trojan blood – until his son Lausus bravely and selflessly sacrifices his own life to stop a sword thrust that would have killed Mezentius. The grieving father regrets living on after his son’s death. Aeneas engages Mezentius in single combat and soundly defeats him. And the despicable Mezentius manages to achieve a measure of dignity in his final moments, asking to be buried beside his beloved son Lausus as “he offers up his throat to the sword” (p. 401).
And so, the Aeneid progresses towards a conclusion that may be divinely pre-ordained but still makes for suspenseful reading. While the political element – the recurring need for Virgil to include references to the great leaders Julius Caesar and Augustus Caesar – can be jarring, it may also have been inevitable given the highly politicized nature of the Roman state during the century in which Virgil lived. However, a modern reader can overlook the politics and appreciate the richness of the poetry.
If you have a friend who loves classical literature, you may one day notice Fagles’ Penguin Classics translations of the Iliad (with a blue cover), the Odyssey (with a red cover), and the Aeneid (with a gold cover) on their bookshelf. If your friend has purchased and read these editions, then their time and money have been well spent.

**"The Aeneid: A Grand Blend of the Iliad and the Odyssey"**

The Aeneid is a magnificent mixture between the Iliad and the Odyssey.

The elements, the topics, the literary figures that give power and depth to the narrative and the characters who star in it are a strong indication that Virgil wanted the story to be told in this way; as a reminder of those very important poems. And that is more than enough reason to want to read it because in my opinion it was a quite entertaining and digestible tale, even much more so than the ones mentioned above.

The story follows Aeneas, a Trojan who, after the loss of Troy against the Achaean army, has been pushed to find a place to take refuge with a large part of the people who follow him. On the way, which will be quite long and difficult, he will have the help of a goddess who will guide him, but at the same time there will be another who will do everything in her power so that he does not achieve his mission. Without a doubt, the gods will take the leading role that they have always had in the terrible events that accompany the characters, as well as fate, the omens and the divine interventions. There will be a lot of violence, civil/affective conflicts and also the future of a promised city in the midst of wars and conquests; until the arrival at the very hell.

The first part, which goes from books I to VI, is a clear reference to the Odyssey with the hero's journey towards the desired place, surrounded by adventures and forging a narrative in which we will be nourished by details about how the victory of the Achaeans over the Trojans developed and much of the destiny of those involved. And the second part, which goes from books VII to XII, tells the arrival and conquest of Aeneas in Italy, a place that would later be known as Rome. Also, the tragic and violent tone wrapped in deaths and tense and bloody conflicts is a good reference to the Iliad.

In short, what I want to get to is that if you have read the Iliad and the Odyssey and you have liked them very much, this is a story that is worth reading, because it draws largely from these Homeric poems and the influence of these in the Aeneid is noticeable, an epic as epic as its predecessors. Or even more, since it has several intense and moving scenes like few others.

It is truly impossible to rank a book as significant as this one. It is a work that is rife with numerous problems, yet it also contains moments of profound and beautiful simile and metaphor. The treatment of its lead character is shockingly inconsistent, and its ending is an eruption of a modern plot that somehow redeems the entire book.

The Ferry translation is both quick and good, and it is definitely worth noting.

Throughout the text, there is a staggering overlap with The Iliad and the Odyssey. The appearances of Cyclops, Scylla, and Charybdis are surprises, as is the rip-off of the in media res structure. We have storms, a separation of forces, and a host. However, everything seems condensed.

Dido, as one might hope, leaps off the page. That amazing section on page 17 that scans over her dead husband is unbelievably Hamlet-like, and there is something tragic about Cupid's bewitching her.

But, like the windmills in Don Quixote, she is too quickly gone.

The Roman propaganda is interesting throughout, but in some ways, it is less pronounced than one might have thought, save for one outrageous description of a piece of armor. It put me in mind of just Grossman's Stalingrad. To get it past the Soviet censors, he had to add a 40-page section about how heroic coal miners are. I ended up fascinated by that section, in its lack of nuance and its propulsion, in how a talented writer operates in restrictive systems.

The second half, set in Italy, is a more human-oriented text, and somewhat ridiculous. The book's supporting characters, especially the lovers Nisus and Euryalus, are stronger than the lead. The book is rarely a page-turner, but it is incredibly worth your time. It is very, very different than you might expect.

Two things stand out. The treatment of the underworld in Book 6 is gorgeous. It is, of course, Dantean pre-Dante. Critic Madeline Miller points out that when Aeneas is in hell, after he finishes admiring the glorious pageant of future Roman heroes, he finds himself before two gates. One is made of horn and is for “true shades.” The other, made of ivory, is for “false dreams.” And Aeneas, the founder of the gleaming vision of Roman history we have just seen, leaves through the latter.

Borges was also preoccupied by this distinction, and I wonder if there are some hints here of the undermining that I feel is at work in The Aeneid, some impulse to attack the very root of the project, of fiction, of the need for Roman propaganda in a poem, even of the need for empire and cultural assimilation.

Which brings me to the ending. I'll spoiler tag.

The ending, those last few lines, are of course the most shocking of all, subversive and bizarre. I've been thinking about them for days, and reading some supplementary material to try to make sense of them. Even if Aeneas had granted Turnus mercy, the book ending without a coda would have felt abrupt, but the sudden heat for vengeance for Pallas jarred me. Pallas doesn't feel important enough a character to warrant this kind of ending, but it felt authentic to Aeneas. Sometimes in writing, when things are going well, the character moves organically. They do something they're not supposed to. I know that this turn is set up earlier in The Aeneid, but it still felt like an extremely organic moment. We've been questioning Aeneas's character throughout the book - his treatment of Dido, his mood-swings. Again, here, at the end, he is back in Troy. A legacy of war and pain. Does this ending redeem the Aeneid as a whole for me? In some ways, yes, because it redeems a lot of my misgivings.

The ending seems to privilege fate above all else, like a tautology. Turnus has to die, so Aeneas has to kill him, and even if Turnus begs for mercy, it won't matter. Can I even go postmodern for a second? Because fate is privileged above god and man, Turnus has to die for the Aeneid to end. And the second he dies: fade to black.

There are numerous reviews here that detail the reasons for or against reading book X. However, this review of Virgil's "Aeneid," a largely-completed first-century BC nationalist epic poem that chronicles the Trojan War and Aeneas's role in the eventual founding of Rome, will instead explain why you should obtain a copy of the "Aeneid" from a university library. Quite simply, it's because of the student annotations.

Nearly every book in a university catalog has, at some point, been borrowed by a student who is using it as primary or supplemental material for a class. Consequently, many books have important passages underlined, major themes listed at the beginnings of chapters, and clarifications written in the margins. The copy of the "Aeneid" that I read not only had thematic annotations from one student but also several unintentionally humorous comments from another. This made reading the epic poem, which spends five pages describing Aeneas's shield, far more entertaining than it otherwise might have been.

For instance, beside a section where the longevity and glory of the Roman Empire were prophesied, a befuddled student wrote, "But Rome fell - did Virgil know this?" Ah, yes, Virgil the time-traveling super-poet who cleverly inserted chronologically ironic statements into his verse. The same annotator observed that Dido's downfall was that she was "too nice" (apparently, feuding goddesses had no bearing on it) and produced a mind-boggling series of rhetorical queries that illustrate the importance of using context when deciphering pronouns in poetry (hint: the closest noun isn't always the antecedent).

Sadly, the annotator only got about a third of the way through the poem before either realizing that he/she could obtain the crucial details from lecture or Wikipedia or dropping the class. As a result, I had to jot down similar comments in order to make it through the remainder of the poem. The moral of this story is that although you may encounter the occasional clueless person marking up your book, reading a book that others have previously commented on gives an undeniable sense of camaraderie. As in any interaction with strangers, you may be pleasantly surprised, disappointed, or surprised into laughter. I wholeheartedly recommend this experience to everyone.

Yani maalesef, lanet olsun ki, okurlukta "mitolojik destan okurken zevkten dört köşe olma" seviyesi var ve buraya geldiğinizde okuduğunuz her şey "birkaç bin yıl önce yazılmış ve zamanını aşmış destanlar" ve "arada okuduğunuz diğer tırıvırılar" şeklinde ayrılıyor.

Ilyada ve Odysseia üzerine okuduğum Aeneis ile bu görüşüm kesinleşti. Şunu okumadan uçamıyorum adeta.

Öte yandan sosyal medyadaki meşhur videolardaki gibi bir mikrofon tutulup "o mu bu mu" yapılsa sonunda Homeros giiiirllll çıkacağım da kesinleşti bunu okuyunca. Ben Homeros'un ritmli diline, şiirli anlatımına aşığım. Ve hiçbir şey benim için bir Ilyada olmayacak, belli.

Neyse, Aeneis okumuşken Ilyada övmeyelim; Aeneis övelim: Kronolojik olarak Ilyada'nın devamı olması, o hikayeye bir son vermesi; arada kehanet ya da benzeri anlatılarla Roma imparatorluğunun geleceğini anlatmasıyla muhteşem bir eser. Zaman geçtikçe, konuyla ilgili bilgi edindikçe döne döne okunur. Tabi şu ufak uyarıyı da eklemem lazım: Öncesinde Ilyada'yı ve Odysseia'yı okumanız şart.

Aeneis'in bayıldığım bir diğer özelliği de şu -sıradan çinkokarbon kitap gibi binlerce yıllık kitapta bayıldığım özellik saymam?- metin daha insani aslında. Birbirlerine çok komik laf çarpıyorlar. Odysseus'tan Paris'e hakaret yemeyen kimse yok, defalarca kahkaha attım okurken.

Velhasıl, ben kitap nedir, ne anlatmaktadır, ana fikri o mudur bu mudur anlatmayı sevmem; Google orada duruyor. Ama deneyim olarak hayatınız boyunca anımsayacağınız sayılı kitaptan biri olduğunu söyleyebilirim. Ufacık merakınız varsa listenize ekleyiniz.

The reason that I picked up this Latin epic book is the countless inter-textual references to this mythology book in the books I previously read.

However, I was not even half-satisfied to find none of them in this translation. In that sense, it was a bit of a letdown. But, coming to this translation:

"Can there be so much anger in the hearts of the heavenly gods?" This line just summarizes the whole story of prophetic wanderings and wars of Aeneas. He was a Trojan who was forced to leave his own land Troy with his arms, men, father, and son, and a sign from the above.

The divine interventions he encounters are always mixed blessings. While his mother Venus comes to aid during his hard times, the mother of gods, Juno always contrives some disastrous plan against him. The reasons for this are quite uncertain. "Women are unstable creatures, always changing!" says Mercury who comes in rescue of Aeneas from that nuptial trap of Dido.

As Aeneas sets sailing, hardships, rough weather, and unfortunate deaths that befall him are countless, inexorable, and irrevocable. All credits to the relentless efforts of Juno and the oversight of the god of gods. When the rumor does her part to bring unforeseen troubles to the ill-fated and embittered Aeneas and his son Ascanius from faraway lands and distant enemies, the god of war, Mars feels a pinching responsibility for his divine position and breaks all hell loose in the name of war on the poor mortals who try to endure all difficulties hoping on the divine destiny.

The wars, wanderings, and wraths seem to continue: Treaties are broken, wars are waged, lands are ransacked, ships are wrecked, fathers are broken, mothers are heart-wrenched, sons are killed, daughters are sullied and animals are slaughtered. Are the gods satisfied?

What I like much about the book are the vivid narrations of the misery of fathers who sent their sons to war, and mothers whose sons went to war without telling them. What I don't like about the book are the countless sacrifices. The only times when there were no hints of sacrifices were when they coughed or farted. Oh, forgive me, it is just my level of understanding on sacrifices or anything of that sort is very low.

So, if you want to know what happens to the guy who gets the sword from Orlando Bloom i.e. Paris from the TROY movie at the end, you might want to check this out. Well, hey! there is HOMER, too!