The Stories of Similes in Greek and Roman Epic

Similes create a distinctive world of embodied experiences that partner with the mythological story to shape epic narrative.

Deborah Beck (Author)

9781108741415, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 18 September 2025

292 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.5 cm, 0.426 kg

'Overall, a very novel book on a major theme, which allows a synthetic look at a trait of the epic genre that counts for much in its poetic success, in its continuity and its renewals. I recommend reading it in its entirety to specialists, but also to all those interested in ancient literature.' Françoise Létoublon, Bryn Mawr Classical Review

Just as the story of an epic poem is woven from characters and plot, so too the individual similes within an epic create a unique simile world. Like any other story, it is peopled by individual characters, happenings, and experiences, such as the shepherd and his flocks, a storm at sea, or predators hunting prey. The simile world that complements the epic mythological story is re-imagined afresh in relation to the themes of each epic poem. As Deborah Beck argues in this stimulating book, over time a simile world takes shape across many poems composed over many centuries. This evolving landscape resembles the epic story world of battles, voyages, and heroes that comes into being through relationships among different epic poems. Epic narrative is woven from a warp of the mythological story world and a weft of the simile world. They are partners in creating the fabric of epic poetry.

1. Homer Odyssey: heroism, home, and family
2. Homer Iliad: leadership and loss
3. Apollonius Argonautica: gender, emotion, and the limits of human skill
4. Vergil Aeneid: rage and isolation
5. Ovid Metamorphoses: stories of Eros and Epic.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: poetry & poets [DSC], Literary studies: classical, early & medieval [DSBB], Semantics, discourse analysis, etc [CFG]