Ancient epics remain a fount of inspiration for poets, dramatists, and musicians not only because they tell good stories in an aesthetically beautiful way, but also because they speak to contemporary hearts and minds still wrestling with timeless issues of human limitation, passion, violence, and uses and abuses of power.

Ancient Epic offers a comprehensive and accessible introduction to six of the greatest ancient epics - Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Vergil's Aeneid, Ovid's Metamorphoses, and Apollonius of Rhodes' Agonautica. * Provides an accessible introduction to the ancient epic * Offers interpretive analyses of poems within a comprehensive historical context * Includes a detailed timeline, suggestions for further readings, and an appendix of the Olympian gods and their Akkadian counterparts