2 Ergebnisse.

Examining five ancient texts, this volume addresses the classical Western conception of the epic. Though they may not all conform exactly to the conventions, much is to be gained by considering these ancient narratives collectively, as parts of a composite human whole.

All five of the epics discussed in this volume came to serve as the basis for an ethnic and national tradition of history, religion, and literature documenting, sometimes encyclopedically, the crucially formative events of a people's early collective experience. A sequential study of these stories will invite and provoke comparative questions and discussions of similar or parallel images, episodes, cultural values, narrative strategies, and po...