BASED ON WESTERN EPIC MODELS

From M. H. Abrams, A Glossary of Literary Terms, 6th ed. (1993)

From Stuart H. Blackburn, Peter J. Claus, Joyce B. Flueckiger, and Susan S. Wadley, eds. Oral Epics of India (1989).

1.  Long narrative poem on serious subject

1.  Narrative:  tells a story in song, poetry, rhythmic prose, with perhaps some unsung parts

2.  Told in formal, elevated style

2.  Poetic: formulaic, ornamental style

3.  Centers on heroic or quasi-divine figures on whose actions depend the fate of a group, a nation, and/or all humankind

[Myth critic Northrop Frye: characters have great powers “acting at or near the limits of desire” -  from The Anatomy of Criticism (1957).]

3.  Heroic: tells adventures of extraordinary people.
a. Martial and human blends with the magical and celestial, with no clear division between the two realms; hero/ines often deified after death, crossing from human to divine.
b. Epic hero/ines are not necessarily models or exemplary ideals for human behavior; ie. hero/ine’s actions may not offer practical advice or assistance to the rest of us in living our everyday lives

4.  Action is heroic deeds in battle, long, arduous journeys, or quests

[Myth critic Northrop Frye identifies the quest-myth as the central or “mono-myth” of literature.

[Rene Girard has examined the central role of ritual sacrifice and its relation to myths, as integrated into classical Greek tragedy: he argues ritual sacrifice is society’s effort to deflect upon a relatively “sacrificeable” victim the violence that would otherwise be vented on the community as a whole (from La Violence et la sacre 1972).]

4.  Three epic types (in Indian cultures):

a.  martial: war, battle, struggle at center, e.g. for revenge, lost lands, restoration of lost rights;
At stake: power, social obligations, social unity and continuity

b.  sacrificial: heroic act of self-sacrifice or suicide at center, of ten of a woman who becomes a goddess or a sati (immolates herself on husband’s funeral pyre)

5.  Gods and other supernatural beings take an interest and an active role in human affairs.

[Myth critic Northrup Frye: Western literature is “massively funded by the powerful myths of the Bible and classical [Greek and Roman] culture”]

5.  Deities and humankind:  Gods mix in human affairs for their own  and the cosmos’ benefit; when trouble threatens, the gods shift it to earth; and epic heroes--and by extension the rest of us--become the gods’ scapegoats.  Epics attribute social, sexual, and moral problems of humankind to the will of the gods (e.g. Gods make humans sin, die, and expose humans to appalling social, sexual, and moral conflicts; hero/ines cannot escape fate and evil; human suffering is inevitable and life is ruthlessly fatalistic)

1.  “Traditional epics” are written versions of what were originally oral poems or songs about cultural heroes developed in a warlike age.  E.g. Iliad, Odyssey, Beowolf

2.  “Literary epics” are composed first in writing to imitate “traditional epics” - e.g. Milton’s Paradise Lost

2.  [“Literary epics” are also generated by Indian literate cultures.]

3.  Ceremonial performance, for which style is deliberately stylized and distanced from ordinary speech as befitting the grandeur and formality of the heroic subject

3.  Ceremonial performance: Sanskrit classical epics live in contemporary national/regional performance traditions: song-recitation and dance-drama, often entailing spirit possession, trance-dance, and ritual - national and regional retellings of  hero/ine’s stories of sacred epics are believed to summon him/her as god/dess and her/his power.

Functions of epic performances include:

Davis, Paul, and others, eds.  Western Literature in a World Context. Vol 1: The Ancient World through the
        Renaissance.  New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1995.

Haviland, William A.  Anthropology.  7th ed.  Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace College Publishers, 1994.