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Essay / Research Paper Abstract
In three pages this paper examines how hell or the underworld is depicted by Virgil in Book VI of ‘The Aeneid’ and also compares it with Homer’s portrayal in Book IX of ‘The Odyssey.’ Two sources are cited in the bibliography.
Page Count:
3 pages (~225 words per page)
File: TG15_TGhell.rtf
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Unformatted sample text from the term paper:
influenced by the most memorable literary depiction of hell found in the Roman dramatist Virgils The Aeneid. In Book VI, Virgil takes his readers on a perilous journey that
encompasses several levels of modulating emotion. This underworld of Dis is a complex place in which there are varying degrees of pain, suffering, grief, and finally calm. Virgils
narrative features his protagonist Aeneas and begins by describing a place that conjures readers frightening images of what hell must be like: "Just in the gate and in the jaws
of hell, Revengeful Cares and sullen Sorrows dwell, And pale Diseases, and repining Age, Want, Fear, and Famines unresisted rage; Here Toils, and Death, and Deaths half-brother, Sleep, Forms terrible
to view, their sentry keep; With anxious Pleasures of a guilty mind, Deep Frauds before, and open Force behind; The Furies iron beds; and Strife, that shakes Her hissing tresses
and unfolds her snakes. Full in the midst of this infernal road, An elm displays her dusky arms abroad: The God of Sleep there hides his heavy head, And empty
dreams on evry leaf are spread" (Virgil 85). Descending to the Acheron River, Aeneas, who is accompanied by female prophet Sibyl, observes a boatman named Charon who is transporting
the souls of the dead across the river. There are "hollow groans, and shrieks, and feeble cries" (Virgil 86). Aeneas notices that while some of the souls receive
passage, others are denied. He is told that those whose bodies have not been buried will be forced to languish along the riverbank. After crossing the river, Aeneas
confronts a "cruel nation, covetous of prey, / Staind with my blood th unhospitable coast; / And now, by winds and waves, my lifeless limbs are tossd" (Virgil 87).
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