Virgil's Gaze: Nation and Poetry in the AeneidVirgil's Aeneid invites its reader to identify with the Roman nation whose origins and destiny it celebrates. But, as J. D. Reed argues in Virgil's Gaze, the great Roman epic satisfies this identification only indirectly--if at all. In retelling the story of Aeneas' foundational journey from Troy to Italy, Virgil defines Roman national identity only provisionally, through oppositions to other ethnic identities--especially Trojan, Carthaginian, Italian, and Greek--oppositions that shift with the shifting perspective of the narrative. Roman identity emerges as multivalent and constantly changing rather than unitary and stable. The Roman self that the poem gives us is capacious--adaptable to a universal nationality, potentially an imperial force--but empty at its heart. However, the incongruities that produce this emptiness are also what make the Aeneid endlessly readable, since they forestall a single perspective and a single notion of the Roman. |
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Nation and Poetry in the Aeneid Joseph D Reed. This page intentionally left blank VIRGIL'S GAZE NATION AND POETRY IN THE AENEID J. D..
Nation and Poetry in the Aeneid Joseph D Reed. VIRGIL'S GAZE NATION AND POETRY IN THE AENEID J. D. Reed PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS PRINCETON AND OXFORD Copyright © 2007 by Princeton University Press Published by Princeton.
Nation and Poetry in the Aeneid Joseph D Reed. Copyright © 2007 by Princeton University Press Published by Princeton ... Aeneid / J. D. Reed. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978-0-691-12740-8 (hardcover ...
Nation and Poetry in the Aeneid Joseph D Reed. This page intentionally left blank PREFACE This book studies the way Virgil's Aeneid defines a.
Nation and Poetry in the Aeneid Joseph D Reed. PREFACE This book studies the way Virgil's Aeneid defines a nationality—one that the poem invites us to understand as Roman—out of a play of contrasts between nationalities. It is intended ...
Contents
1 | |
Euryalus | 16 |
Turnus | 44 |
Dido | 73 |
Andromache | 101 |
Ancient Cities | 129 |
Marcellus | 148 |
Aeneas | 173 |
BIBLIOGRAPHY | 203 |
INDEX OF TEXTS CITED | 211 |
GENERAL INDEX | 223 |