Second Impression April 1913
Third Impression March 1917
Fourth Impression January 1920
Fifth Impression August 1924
Composed and Printed By
The University of Chicago Press
Chicago, Illinois U.S.A.
PREFACE
The epic is a drama on gigantic scale; its acts are years or centuries; its actors, heroes; its stage, the world of life; its events, those mighty cycles of activity that leave their deep impress on human history. Homer’s epics reënact the stirring scenes of the ten years’ siege of Troy, and the perilous, long wanderings of Ulysses before he reached his home; Vergil’s epic action embraces the fall of Troy and the never-ending struggles of Æneas and his band of exiles till Troy should rise again in the western world; Tasso pictures the heroic war of Godfrey and his crusaders, who strove to free the holy city of Jerusalem; and Milton, ignoring all bounds of time and space, fills his triple stage of heaven, earth, and hell with angels, men, and devils, all working out the most stupendous problems of human destiny.
Such gigantic dramas could be presented on no human stage. But in them all are lesser actions of marked dramatic possibility. Notable among these are the events culminating in the death of Hector, the home coming of Ulysses and his destruction of the suitors, Satan’s rebellion and expulsion from heaven, and the temptation and fall of man. All these furnish abundant material for the tragic stage; but all leave much to be supplied of speech and action before the full-rounded drama could take form. In the Æneid alone is found, among the minor parts which make up the epic whole, a dramatic action well-nigh complete—the love story of Æneas and Dido.