The Artistic Features of Homer's Epic

The artistic features of Homer's epic are compact structure and ingenious arrangement.

Epic focuses on a person, an event and a period of time by means of concentration, generalization and concentration.

Epic has also made great achievements in characterization. Created many characters with complex personalities and distinct levels; Put the characters in a certain situation, describe their language and actions in detail with exaggerated techniques and colorful poems, and show their character.

For example, the Greek general Achilles, who is a model of male beauty, combines youth, beauty, courage, love, loyalty, bravery and kindness, and has a three-dimensional and diverse personality.

Epic has also made great achievements in characterization. Many characters have been created, but they are not the same or repeated. The main way to create a character image is to put the character in a certain situation, describe the character's language and movements in detail, and express the character with exaggerated techniques and gorgeous poems.

Creation background

Homer's Epic is not a one-off work, but a history preserved in the memory of all Greeks. After the Trojan War, some folk singers and artists from the Greek city-states composed the heroic deeds and victories of the Greeks in the war into lyrics and sang them at public gatherings.

These stories were handed down by folk singers, and after centuries of continuous acquisition and revision, they were cut into two parts in Homer's hands and became rigid works. Around the middle of the 6th century BC, when Cytra was in power in Athens (about 605-527 BC), it was finally fixed in words.

The Homer epic we see today was compiled by scholars in Alexandria in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC. 1795, the German scholar Wolff made a detailed study of the epic along this line of thought, thus asserting that each part of the epic had been sung by the singer as an independent poem.

After many times of finishing and processing, it has become what we see today. Later, Wolff's compatriot Rahman expounded his views more clearly, thus forming the "short song theory".