women and relationships
feminist Critique- the poem has a patriarchal core where women are regularly sacrificed to the greater mission
Dido must die so that Aeneas can leave Carthage Bk4
Creusa must die so that Aeneas can marry Lavinia later on Bk2
The women are left behind in Bk5 so that the Trojans can start new lives when they reach Italy
Aeneas the puppet
Camps- Aeneas is a puppet, controlled mechanically by forces outside himself
Bk4-He is forced to leave Carthage by Jupiter and Mercury, even though it was clear that he wanted to stay as the first time Mercury came down he was wearing clothes Dido gave him
the characterisation of Dido
Jenkyns- Dido is a sympathetic figure
Bk1- Venus and Juno force Dido to go against her vow to never marry again by using Cupid to make Dido fall in love with Aeneas, leading her to neglect Carthage and fall out of favour with her people
Dido the victim
Mac Gorain- Dido is one of many collateral victims of Rome’s rise
Bk5- Palinurus is killed by Venus and Neptune so that the Trojans could reach the Laurentine Thybris
Bk2- Laocoon and his children are killed by the gods for trying to stop the Trojans
Bk2- Creusa must die so that Aeneas can marry Lavinia
Aeneas the hero
Hall- Aeneas is a pious hero
Aeneas’ characterisation
Hardie- Aeneas is bland because of the plot
Aeneas and piety
Mackie- Aeneas’ general concern to facilitate his fate is the cornerstone of his pietas
Aeneas before and after Book 6
Williams- before Book 6, Aeneas is weak and uncertain but after seeing the future, he is strengthened and resolved to be successful in his mission
Creusa(the role of women)
Jenkyns- Creusa is the ideal Roman matron
Women and death
Hall- all the powerful women in the Aeneid die
Aeneas and Augustus
Griffin- Aeneas is a reflection of Augustus
Dido and Cleopatra
Hardie- Dido is a depicted as a dangerous woman- similar to the real life threat of Cleopatra
characterisation of Juno
Gransden- Juno embodies the dreaded spirit of civil strife
the use of the Aeneid
Williams- it is clear that the major intention of the Aeneid was to glorify Rome and Augustus
characterisation of Jupiter
Gransden- Jupiter is a more dignified version Homer’s Zeus
Juno and the plot
Gransden- most of the plot of the Aeneid is generated by Juno
Aeneas and war
Williams- Aeneas fights because he must only to fulfil his duty
Heroism and war
Quinn- the urge to kill is part of being a Homeric hero, but Virgil shows the unpleasantness of this urge when Aeneas goes on a rampage in Bk10 fuelled by furor
Aeneid as propaganda
Toll- the Aeneid is a poem of national identity
the purpose of the Aeneid
Toll- Virgil wanted to provide for his own nation a poetic prehistory as antique and deep-rooted as the one Homer provided for Greece and the Greeks
The Aeneid and propaganda
Grebe- Virgil’s epic is a piece of propaganda that reinforces the divine foundation of the emperor’s auctoritas
Familial bonds
Sowerby- the relationship between father and son is the closest in the poem
Femininity and masculinity
Oliensis- Virgil associates the feminine with unruly passion, the masculine with reasoned mastery. In the poem this tends to mean that women make trouble and men restore order
Women as submissive figures
Oliensis- the uncomplicatedly virtuous women of the epic, Creusa and Lavinia prove their virtue precisely by submitting to the masculine plot of history. Creusa accepts her relegation to the past and Lavinia doesn’t resist her exploitation for the future of Rome
War and punishment
West- describes the wars between the Greeks and Trojans, the war between the Trojans and Italians and the subsequent founding of Rome is a victory with a price
E.g the death of Pallas in Bk10
Dido
Ard- Dido is a woman of extremes