Virgil’s Aeneid. A Reader’s Guide (review)

Ancient texts present a number of interpretative stumbling blocks to non-specialist readers. Lack of familiarity with literary traditions, historical developments, and cultural norms, for example, frequently hinder the modern reader’s appreciation of Classical literature. This is very often the case, as David O. Ross illustrates in this splendid book, with Virgil’s Aeneid. Ross likewise contends that many past readers of the Aeneid have misinterpreted some of its important features and reduced many of its intricacies to hackneyed formulations and dichotomies. It is in response to these issues that Ross offers his book as both a guide to some of the poem’s most significant and influential elements and an attempt to remedy some of these misunderstandings. This approach is a refreshing departure from the normal agenda in such an undertaking and lends this work much of its appeal. But it is Ross’ sensitivity to and deep knowledge of the text and the clarity with which he articulates his interpretation of it that remain the greatest sources of the book’s success.

The topics of the six chapters in the book offer few surprises. In the first chapter, for instance, Ross illustrates some of the characteristic traits of Aeneas as hero and considers his relationships with father, son and mother. In Chapter Two he offers a comparable analysis of victims such as Dido, Turnus, Pallas and Lausus. Gods and fate are the subjects of Chapter Three. Ross reviews some of the distinctive features of Roman gods and how and when the Olympian gods were adopted into Roman culture, before turning to an examination of the actions of the gods in Books 1 and 12. In Chapter Four there is a very rewarding discussion of the various depictions of Troy in the poem (Ross’ analysis of Book 2 is particularly good), while in Chapter Five Ross explores the presentations of Rome and Roman history in Books 1, 6 and 8 and reveals how each is offered as a form of consolation but also ends in such a way as to force the reader to re-evaluate what has just been described. In the last chapter there is an overview of some details of Virgil’s life and a discussion of important elements of the Eclogues and Georgics. A more surprising component of the book is the appendix, in which Ross explains the Latin hexameter with examples drawn from the Aeneid. This review is somewhat unexpected in a work that is aimed, for the most part, at readers without knowledge of Latin, but its effectiveness in conveying some of the Latin artistry of Virgilian poetry makes it a welcome addition. The main divisions along which Ross arranges his discussion therefore manage to orient the reader to the cultural climate in which Virgil’s poem originates and enable examination and interpretation of many of the key features of the poem. Throughout the book, moreover, Ross judiciously manages to ground his discussion both through consideration of the text as a whole and through close, detailed readings of specific books and passages.

As a reader’s guide to the Aeneid, several features of Ross’ book stand out. One of the most notable is that the book, as Ross emphasizes in his preface, is meant as a guide and not an introduction. Ross chooses not to summarize content or exhaustively list specific features of the poem, but rather selects and explores what he believes to be some of the essential features of the poem in as meaningful a way as possible. One of the most distinctive and stimulating characteristics of Ross as a guide to the Aeneid is his willingness to correct what he believes has been misunderstood or neglected in the interpretation of the poem. In the first chapter on Aeneas, for instance, Ross’ analysis of character proceeds from the argument that Aeneas does not possess the lack of emotional depth and human responsiveness that is often attributed to him. In a series of close readings of...