Virgil: A Study In Civilized Poetry (oklahoma Series In Classical Culture Series)

In this classic study, Brooks Otis presents Virgil as a radically different poet from any of his Greek or Roman predecessors. Virgil molded the ancient epic tradition to his own Roman contemporary aims and succeeded in making mythical and legendary figures meaningful to a sophisticated, unmythical age. Otis begins and ends his study with the Aeneid and includes chapters on the Bucolics and the Georgics. A new foreword by Ward W. Briggs, Jr., places Otis’s groundbreaking achievement in the context of past and present Virgilian scholarship.

Brooks Otis was Professor of Classics at Stanford University (later Professor of Latin at the University of North Carolina) and the author of Ovid As an Epic Poet and Cosmos and Tragedy.