Epic poetry

Epic poetry tells a dramatic story in a poem. It is usually long, has characters, and takes place in different settings. Epic poems started in prehistoric times as part of oral tradition.

Beowulf is a famous example, written in Old English. Well-known people who wrote epics were Homer, Virgil, Ovid, Dante, Edmund Spenser and Milton. William Wordsworth's Prelude plays with epic ideas, though the poem is autobiographical. The Kyrgyz Epic of Manas is one of the longest written epics in history.

Characteristics

Epic poems have seven main characteristics:

1. The hero is outstanding. They might be important, and historically or legendarily significant.
2. The setting is large. It covers many nations, or the known world.
3. The hero's actions require great or superhuman courage.
4. Supernatural forces—gods, angels, demons—insert themselves in the action.
5. The poem is written in a very special style (verse as opposed to prose).
6. The poet tries to remain objective.
7. Epic poems are believed to be supernatural and real by the hero and the villain.

Usually, in epic poems:

1. The poem starts with the theme or subject of the story.
2. In epics inspired from Western civilization, the writer invokes a Muse, one of the nine daughters of Zeus. The poet prays to the Muse for divine inspiration to tell the great story.
3. The narrative opens in medias res, or in the middle of things, usually with the hero at his lowest point. Usually flashbacks show earlier portions of the story.
4. Catalogues and genealogies are given. Often, the poet is honoring audience members' ancestors.
5. Main characters give extended formal speeches.
6. The poem uses the epic simile.
7. Repetition or stock phrases are used frequently.
8. The poem presents heroic ideals like courage, honour, sacrifice, patriotism and kindness.
9. The poem gives a clear window of the social and cultural patterns of the contemporary life. (For example, Beowulf shows how people at the time loved wine, wild celebration, war, adventure and sea voyages.)

Examples

Ancient

• 20th to 10th century BC:
  • Epic of Gilgamesh (Mesopotamia)
• 8th century BC to 3rd century AD:
  • Mahābhārata (Indian mythology)
• 8th to 6th century BC:
  • Iliad and Odyssey, ascribed to Homer (Greek mythology)
• 1st century BC:
  • Aeneid, Vergil (Latin)

Medieval

• Song of Roland
• 8th to 10th century AD
  • Beowulf (Old English)
• 12th to 13th century AD
  • Sirat Bani Hilal (Arabic) *[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taghribat_Bani_Hilal]*
• 10th to 12th century AD
  • Njál's saga (Old Norse)
• 14th century AD
  • Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (dialect of middle English)

Contemporary

Omeros (1990), Derek Walcott

Empire of Dreams (1988), Giannina Braschi

Related pages

• Lyric poetry - contrary notion