The primacy of vision in Virgil's Aeneid / Riggs Alden Smith.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Smith, R. Alden.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Aeneas (Legendary character) in literature.

Epic poetry, Latin--History and criticism.

Epic poetry, Latin.

Visual perception in literature.

Art and literature--Rome.

Art and literature.

Visions in literature.

Vision in literature.

Rome--In literature.

Rome.

Virgil. Aeneis.

Virgil.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (272 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Austin : University of Texas Press, 2005.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

One of the masterpieces of Latin and, indeed, world literature, Virgil's Aeneid was written during the Augustan "renaissance" of architecture, art, and literature that redefined the Roman world in the early years of the empire. This period was marked by a transition from the use of rhetoric as a means of public persuasion to the use of images to display imperial power. Taking a fresh approach to Virgil's epic poem, Riggs Alden Smith argues that the Aeneid fundamentally participates in the Augustan shift from rhetoric to imagery because it gives primacy to vision over speech as the principal means of gathering and conveying information as it recounts the heroic adventures of Aeneas, the legendary founder of Rome. Working from the theories of French phenomenologist Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Smith characterizes Aeneas as a voyant-visible, a person who both sees and is seen and who approaches the world through the faculty of vision. Engaging in close readings of key episodes throughout the poem, Smith shows how Aeneas repeatedly acts on what he sees rather than what he hears. Smith views Aeneas' final act of slaying Turnus, a character associated with the power of oratory, as the victory of vision over rhetoric, a triumph that reflects the ascendancy of visual symbols within Augustan society. Smith's new interpretation of the predominance of vision in the Aeneid makes it plain that Virgil's epic contributes to a new visual culture and a new mythology of Imperial Rome.

Contents:

Prophaenomena ad Vergilium

Ruse and revelation : visions of the divine and the telos of narrative

Vision past and future

Hic amor : love, vision, and destiny

Vision's victory and the telos of narrative

Conclusion.

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Includes bibliographical references (p. 223-235) and index.

ISBN:

9780292796829

029279682X

OCLC:

608710705