In reading the Aeneid, you are sharing in one of the great common experiences of our culture. Until fairly recently, every educated person in the Western world had read the Aeneid in Latin and could employ quotations from it. T.S. Eliot himself said, "Virgil acquires the centrality of the unique classic; he is at the centre of European civilization...Our classic, the classic of all Europe, is Virgil." So, what is a classic?
It may suffice to say that a classic has universality; i.e., that it rises above personal likes and dislikes. Popular works, even pop music, seek the acceptance of public opinion, but genuine classics test the individual reader or listener. T.R. Glover says, "In judging Virgil the reader judges himself; his comments merely tell a sentient world what he himself is fit for."
You will have to judge these endorsements and the characteristics of the classic as you experience the Aeneid. You will not learn about these by reading about them in other places. That sort of knowledge is useful supplementally, but is not valuable by itself.
Classics are also inexhaustible. As many times as I have read the Aeneid (I think this is my 23rd reading), I always find something new. Please do not anticipate that this blog or even an entire book would provide anything greater than partial understanding. As you progress through the Aeneid, you will want to refer to other books to help you interpret what has transpired. This blog aims to give you a minimal introduction to the literal meaning of the text. Without knowledge of the plain meaning, any talk about the subtleties of language, the beauty of the imagery, or the construction of the plot becomes useless.
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3 comments:
To borrow a phrase from two speakers, in fact, at gov school, that they borrowed from Ezra Proud (what can I say, it's a good quote!) "Literature is news that stays news." A classic is something that many people can relate to and discuss at any point in time. A true classic, in my mind, won't ever become so old it's 'out of style' or antiquated, but on the same level isn't so new that people can't relate. The subject and presentation have to be in the way that appeal to whatever human qualities we all have, not just whatever our culture gives us. A lot of books, though, are considered classics that don't fit how I just defined it. So maybe there's something more to it, or maybe there ought to be another category. Time/culture restricted classics?
And I have to very much agree with your last sentence. Even in English poetry, but especially more so in Latin where my mind is only 5 or 6 years old, sometimes there has to be a choice between the understanding of style and content. More time and effort can alleviate some of that, true, but only familiarity with some parts of what you're looking at really helps. And with that, it's one step at a time...
"...sometimes there has to be a choice between the understanding of style and content."
Well said. We'll talk more about the four levels of interpretation when we reach the Latin so that we lessen the sacrifice of our understanding of style for content. But you're perfectly right that there is no substitute for experience.
"A lot of books, though, are considered classics that don't fit how I just defined it."
What books, considered classics, do you think don't fit your definition?
I'm thinking more across cultures, or at least I think that's what I think. μεν, if someone from Africa were to pick up A Tale of Two Cities with next to no knowledge of the time in which it was set, would it chime as well as it does in European type places? δε, I suppose though that argument is no argument at all, seeing as we read Things Fall Apart here. But I've read some classics, like those by Jane Austen, that, while charming in their own right, make me have to think through many cultural things before I get to the substance of the book. On the other other hand (μεν... δε... μενδε?), fortasse my opinion of such a sort means nothing, because it's not whether the individual understands it (that would eliminate all books from the classic category) but what the populace thinks of it.
And the ηοι πολοι and their book preferences have now thoroughly confoggled my brain. It's just... so many reviews call books "This is a new classic!" or "This author is the next Jane Austen" or "This musician is the modern Mozart" (How in the world can there be classic rock when it's only so many years old?) I just can't help but question the nature of the 'classic' classification, because it seems to vary depending on what you're talking about in relation to what.
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