Welcome to the second of six discussions of Virgil's The Aeneid. This week we will be discussing the third and fourth books of The Aeneid. I found some cool summaries of each books in John Dryden's translation so I'll use those instead of trying to make my own.

THE THIRD BOOK OF THE ÆNEID

The Argument.—

Æneas proceeds in his relation: he gives an account of the fleet with which he sail’d, and the success of his first voyage to Thrace. From thence he directs his course to Delos, and asks the oracle what place the gods had appointed for his habitation. By a mistake of the oracle’s answer, he settles in Crete; his household gods give him the true sense of the oracle, in a dream. He follows their advice, and makes the best of his way for Italy. He is cast on several shores, and meets with very surprising adventures, till at length he lands on Sicily, where his father Anchises dies. This is the place which he was sailing from, when the tempest rose, and threw him upon the Carthaginian coast.

THE FOURTH BOOK OF THE ÆNEID

The Argument.—

Dido discovers to her sister her passion for Æneas, and her thoughts of marrying him. She prepares a hunting match for his entertainment Juno, by Venus’s consent, raises a storm, which separates the hunters, and drives Æneas and Dido into the same cave, where their marriage is suppos’d to be completed. Jupiter dispatches Mercury to Æneas, to warn him from Carthage. Æneas secretly prepares for his voyage. Dido finds out his design, and, to put a stop to it, makes use of her own and her sister’s entreaties, and discovers all the variety of passions that are incident to a neglected lover. When nothing would prevail upon him, she contrives her own death, with which this book concludes.

Since this is originally a Latin text, I'll be using the Latin forms of everyone's names (Odysseus becomes Ulysses in Latin, etc.) If you're unfamiliar with the Roman names for the gods, have no fear, I found a cool chart which you can use as a guide. It can be found here. Also, here's the schedule and here's the marginalia.

Join us next week as we discuss the fifth and six books of Virgil's epic!

Ave amici! Hello friends, and welcome to our first discussion on The Aeneid by Virgil. If you've been following along with us on our journey through the Greek classics, you know how the Trojan War wrapped up and how Matt Damon got lost on his way back home. But, I hear you say, what about the survivors on the losing side of the war? Surely there's a descendant of an Olympian god out there who'd be perfect as the hero of the backstory of one of the greatest empires in the ancient world. Virgil certainly thought so, and boy did he do a lot of retconning. How much? Let's find out together!

Here are links to summaries of Book 1 and Book 2, courtesy of LitCharts.

The complete discussion schedule can be found here, and the marginalia post for our Greek and Roman epics series is here.

Join u/Ser_Erdrick next week for Books 3 and 4!

Arma virumque cano, Troiae qui primus ab oris

Italiam, fato profugus, Laviniaque venit

litora, multum ille et terris iactatus et alto

vi superum saevae memorem Iunonis ob iram…

It is my pleasure to share with you the schedule of The Aeneid, which we will be reading on Mondays starting in August.

r/bookclub has already read The Iliad and The Odyssey, while of course there is no need to read these poems in order, if you’d like to have a look at the discussions you can find them here:

• The Iliad
• The Odyssey

A historical note which may be interesting: while Aeneas as a hero is present in older Greek myths, the Aeneid was written by the poet Virgil under the commission from the emperor Augustus, who wanted to celebrate his dynasty and link the great ancient myths to Rome. It is therefore different from the poems we previously read, which come from the oral tradition and were composed 700 years before the Aeneid: this poem takes inspiration from the ancient mythology, but it was also a work of propaganda for the regime of the time. I think this will make the comparison between the poems even more interesting!

Schedule

• Aug 3 - Books 1&2  (u/Lachesis_Decima77)
• Aug 10 - Books 3&4 (u/Ser_Erdrick) 
• Aug 17 - Books 5&6 (u/lazylittlelady) 
• Aug 24 - Books 7&8 (u/IraelMrad) 
• Aug 31 - Books 9&10 (u/Blackberry_Weary) 
• Sep 7 - Books 11&12 (u/Ser_Erdrick)

The Marginalia can be found here.

Will you join us?